PMQs Recap: Why was cutting immigration not a priority for Keir Starmer?
Today, Kemi Badenoch pushed the Prime Minister on Labour’s record on immigration.
Keir Starmer has had to reset his government 5 months in, setting out new priorities – immigration was not a priority.
- Because Labour stopped the deterrent, in the first 150 days since the election over 20,000 have crossed the Channel under Labour – up 18 per cent on the same period in the previous year.
- The NCA have said a deterrent is needed. The National Crime Agency said: ‘They just keep popping up – all you need is a phone and a dinghy which aren’t illegal items… no country has ever stopped people trafficking upstream in foreign countries – the Australians have done it but that was with a deportation scheme’ (The Daily Telegraph, 12 September 2023, link).
Keir Starmer has spent years arguing for open borders, fighting controls on immigration and defending terrorists.
- Labour voted against tougher measures to tackle illegal immigration 134 times and voted to block, delay or weaken our plan to stop the boats 126 times in the last Parliament. Labour consistently voted against tougher measures to tackle illegal immigration, including the Illegal Migration Act, Safety of Rwanda Act and other measures (Conservative Research Department Analysis of Hansard, 23 April 2024, archived).
- Keir Starmer intervened to stop the deportation of violent criminals some of whom went on to commit crimes including murder. ‘In February 2020, in the run-up to a previous Jamaica deportation flight, another letter attacking the plans was signed by Opposition leader Sir Keir Starmer and dozens of Labour MPs’ (The Sun, 4 March 2023, link; The Daily Mail, 28 February 2023, link).
- Keir Starmer said it was ‘wrong’ to stop Shamima Begum from returning to the UK and now he has made her defence lawyer the Attorney General. Keir Starmer said stripping Begum of her citizenship ‘was a wrong decision’, and ‘a rushed decision’. Richard Hermer KC was part of the legal team acting for Liberty seeking to overturn the government’s decision to refuse Begum’s leave to enter the UK. He was given a peerage and appointed Attorney General by Keir Starmer (Sky News, Ridge on Sunday, 10 March 2019, archived; Matrix Chambers, accessed 11 December 2024, link).
