On September 30, Keir Starmer addressed Labour Party members at the Liverpool conference, calling them to a fight “for the soul of the country” against the enemy represented by the right-wing populist party Reform UK, led by Nigel Farage. He announced decisions “that members might not always be comfortable with,” referring to the issue currently tearing the British left apart: the control of irregular immigration. On that day alone, 531 more people arrived on English shores after crossing the Channel.
The new set of measures announced last week by Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has caused considerable discomfort among many Labour MPs. Among other things, it proposes increasing the waiting period for permanent residency in the United Kingdom from five to 20 years; a review every 30 months of the status of all asylum seekers, with the possibility of sending them back to their country of origin if the government believes the risk has disappeared; and the option of deporting children born in the U.K. along with their parents.
Up to 20 members of parliament have rebelled, voicing extremely strong criticism, using terms such as “cruelty” or “repugnance,” and accusing the government of imitating the fascist rhetoric of the far right.
“I find it disappointing and depressing that the government is taking such a hard line, especially when children could be among its victims. And I don’t think it’s necessary. We’re not going to defeat Reform by trying to be as tough as they are. They’ll always outdo us. What we must do is remain true to certain basic principles like the Geneva Convention or the European Convention on Human Rights,” laments Alf Dubs (Baron Dubs), the Labour politician who now sits in the House of Lords, in a conversation with EL PAÍS. He was one of the many Jewish children who arrived in the United Kingdom from what was then Czechoslovakia in the operation known as the Kindertransport, which saved them from the Nazi threat. Dubs has dedicated much of his life to the defense and support of refugees.
“Spain has shown that there is a way to move forward on this issue without resorting to all these hysterical policies,” says Dubs. “Far-right parties across Europe are exploiting the refugee issue to gain votes. We see it in Hungary, Slovakia, Italy, Germany, and France. And now it has reached the United Kingdom. Of course, we have to be tough when it comes to fighting the mafias that traffic in migrants, but we must adhere to basic legal principles. The idea that people who have been in this country for almost 20 years can be deported belongs to another era. How do you achieve community integration that way? What do we do with the children who were born here? Do we deport them along with their parents? All these dilemmas are unacceptable.”
Minister Mahmood is of Pakistani origin and a practicing Muslim. Her parents were also undocumented immigrants when they arrived in the U.K. and settled in Birmingham. Starmer’s government believes that her background and her firm, powerful oratory can serve as a shield against internal criticism of the crackdown on irregular immigration. Mahmood herself, who has been the target of numerous racist insults throughout her life, has presented the new measures as a “moral mission” for herself and the Labour Party to stem the current divisions in the country.
“Is this an issue that is dividing the country? If you look at all the polls, the answer has to be yes. Immigration is the issue that raises the most concern, and opinions on it are quite polarized. And it’s something that isn’t going to disappear from the public debate overnight, so in that sense, it was inevitable that the Labour government would try to formulate a response,” explains Mihnea Cuibus, an analyst and researcher at the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford, one of the most reliable and rigorous sources for analyzing and providing statistics on the phenomenon in the United Kingdom.
“When we look at the restrictions imposed on asylum seekers or their families, some of them are certainly severe. They could be described as far-right. But other aspects are more progressive, such as developing safer rules to facilitate legal entry into the country. The Labour government is trying to show that there is a middle ground when it comes to this issue, a way to combat uncontrolled immigration while also welcoming those who enter the country through formal channels. Will this approach work? I’m not sure,” he admits.
There is evident internal unease within the Labour Party. The tightening of immigration policies comes on top of the social spending cuts proposed by the Starmer government, which had to backtrack to quell a rebellion within the parliamentary group. No one disputes the need to control irregular immigration. What unsettles many on the British left is the populist rhetoric used to frame it, and the excessive severity of some of the proposed measures.
“The Labour Party is currently terrified by Reform’s lead in all the polls. As things stand today, the left would be completely swept away in a general election. And the Starmer government is convinced that issues like immigration concern all those voters in the so-called ‘red wall’ [in the Midlands and the North of England], who are socially conservative but have traditionally supported Labour, and who are now attracted to Nigel Farage,” explains Rohan McWilliam, a professor of history at Anglia Ruskin University who specializes in the history of the U.K. left and the Labour Party.
“This is a truly extraordinary moment, a unique crossroads in the history of this very young government. It is comparable to the internal rebellion within the parliamentary group that it already suffered when it tried to impose social cuts to disability benefits. The proposals on immigration have provoked widespread rejection, not only among the more left-leaning wing of the Labour Party, but also among moderate MPs in the mainstream,” says McWilliam, who does not rule out the possibility that internal pressure will once again lead the Starmer government to backtrack.
In the first half of the 1990s, when the first Gulf War, the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia, and the civil war in Somalia erupted, the United Kingdom granted 40,000 asylum applications over a five-year period. In 2023 alone, 50,000 people were granted asylum. More than 100,000 are currently in the middle of the asylum process, awaiting a response. Many live in hotels that have now become frequent targets of attacks by the far right.
Of all the sources consulted by EL PAÍS, it is striking that it was Michael Heseltine — the historic conservative politician who was an ally and rival of Margaret Thatcher — who at 92 years old has dared more than anyone else to put his finger on the sore spot and call things by their name.
“Do you see this?” he says, holding up his cell phone. “They’re affordable in any corner of the world, and anyone can see through them the standard of living in countries like France, Spain, Italy, or the U.K. If you’re a young person seeing all that from the other side of the world, you’re going to say to yourself, ‘I want to be a part of that, I want my family to share in it too, and I’m going to take whatever risks are necessary to get there.’ These are the people who are coming to our countries, and who today play an essential role in our economies and our well-being,” Heseltine explains.
It turns out that, of all British voices, his is the only one who remembers that there was a time when the United Kingdom understood that it could not respond alone to global challenges, an idea that the current Labour Party in government has relegated to the background.
“You’re too young to remember how the Americans launched the Marshall Plan at the end of World War II to rebuild a devastated Europe. I think we should do the same today, combining all European aid programs into one and designing policies aimed at supporting the economies of the countries from which immigrants come. To offer them hope and opportunity, and convince them to stay there and not undertake such a risky journey,” suggests the veteran British politician.
Heseltine is one of the few who today has no problem calling Farage a fascist and comparing his xenophobic message to that of historical figures his generation suffered under, such as Oswald Mosley, the founder of the British Union of Fascists, or Enoch Powell, the politician who poisoned public debate in the United Kingdom with his infamous 1968 “Rivers of Blood” speech.
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