I daresay that I'll upset a few friends with what I have to say here, but I simply don't believe that we can avoid telling the truth. As the only real policies Reform seem to have are related to immigration and they are ahead of the other parties by ten percent in some polls, burying heads in the sand is no longer an option. I had always thought that whatever Sir Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper were or weren't, stupid was not one of them. Hearing Yvette Cooper talking about immigration yesterday. I have had to change my views. Why?
Well lets start by looking at why immigration is an issue for so many people. I talk to a lot of people from all walks of life and there are four reasons which I hear repeated time and time again. These are
1. Illegal immigrants are coming during a housing crisis, taking up all of the social housing and claiming benefits, adding to the tax burden of hard working British people. This means that we have less money in our pockets and our young people are priced out of the housing market.
2. Immigrants are involved in crime and anti social behaviour, not respecting British Culture.
3. Immigrants are changing the face of our towns and cities, Churches, Pubs, etc are disappearing and our High Streets are being overrun with Businesses which are fronts for money laundering.
4. The Police, Courts NHS, Councils and other Government agencies give Immigrants, their culture and their cultural needs preferential treatment, at the expense of indideonous British people.
Regardless of whether you think these statements are true, the reason that a significant number of people in the UK are now committed to voting Reform is because they believe them to be true and also only trust Nigel Farage to deal with their concerns. Sir Keir Starmer has four years to change their minds and prove that he can address their fears. There are two ways he can realistically do this. The first is to demonstrate, beyond reasonable doubt, in a way that the general public will believe, that he is addressing these issues. The second, is to implement policies that address the root causes of the discontent that the likes of Farage are counting on to persaude people to vote Reform.
I was fascinated when I saw Yvette Cooper on the news explaing how she was addressing these fears. Her big idea? To stop care workers from moving to the UK to work in care homes. To me, this is bonkers. The one thing, not even the most ardent Reform supporter has ever suggested we need to do, is stop genuine, hard working immigrants from working in care homes. The concept that there are lots of British people queueing up to work in care homes and are being forced out by immigrants is ridiculous. Of course, some at the fringes of the far right, would deport all immigrants, but that is a really minority view and not why Reform are polling at over 30% in some polls. This policy would be awful for all manner of vulnerble people. It does nothing to address any of reasons listed above.
So what should Starmer be doing? Well, if I was in his shoes, this is what I'd do to address the four issues.
1. The first thing I would do is to make any money given to France dependent on stopping illegal crossings. I'd double the money we pay France to police the channel, but I'd dock a sum for every crossing. We pay France around half a billion pounds a year to stop channel crossings. In 2023, approximately 29,000 people crossed the English Channel in small boats from France to the UK. This number was down from 46,000 in 2022. So if we docked £10,000 f'or every migrant crossing from France, they'd lose the half a billion extra if they let levels rise to 2023 levels again. I believe that the problem would stop and we'd save far more money as we'd not have the bills of housing and feeding migrants. I also believe that the UK government needs to do something to make housing affordable for younger people. That would remove a big cause of resentment.
2. Successive governments have chipped away at Police numbers and made it almost impossible for the Police to do their job. Having an effective Police force costs money. Starmer and Cooper need to properly fund the police. When the Police have the tools to do the job, crime drops and these sort of grumbles dissipate.
3. Yes, our high streets are changing. This has always been the case. If you think of the poem, Rub-a-dub-dub, it refers to the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker. Most of us just have a Tesco's Express instead now. Pubs don't close because "someone wants to put a Mosque there". They close because people stop going to the pub. I'd like to see things like pubs given support and protection from greedy developers, but ultimately if people don't want to use businesses on the High St, then the High Street changes. As for the charges of money laundering, see the answer to 2.
4. I think that there is a perception that the Police and Courts do not enforce the law properly for fear of creating a backlash. The grooming scandal is an example. It seems to me to be a complete no brainer for Yvette Cooper to instruct all police forces and the CPS to enforce the law without prefudice and with equality for all. I have no idea why Cooper hasn't already said publicly "We have reviewed what has been going on and in future, if people comit crime, they will feel the full force of the law, regardless of creed or colour'.
My views on this are not new, I've mentioned all of the above previously in blogs, if not all in one blog previously. I accept that fixing migration is far more complex than can be summed up in one short blog by someone who knows little about the subject. But I can also spot dodgy policies that won't work a mile off. Sir Keir Starmer and Yvette Cooper have clearly panicked after the appalling results in the local elections. They have rushed through a series of completely idiotic suggestions that will do nothing to address the real issues that concern people and everything to damage the social services sector. In short, they've lost the plot