The Labour Government’s sudden release of its White Paper titled “Restoring Control over the Immigration System”, was surely, in part, a response to Labour’s poor performance at the recent local elections. For almost a year in office, Ministers have shown no previous inclination to master a coherent migration policy.
So it is surprising that the White Paper entirely ignored illegal immigration in general, and the small boats crisis in particular. All the more curious given that the focus on legal immigration appears inadequate. A commitment to leave the European Convention on Human Rights is the first and necessary step in taking back control of our borders.
In terms of scale alone, the stated intention to reduce the number of visas issued by around 50,000, given that net migration climbed to 728,000 last year, is modest at best.
In truth, Sir Keir Starmer has never been, and never will, be serious about the need to curb immigration, whether it be illegal or legal, because he is part of the bourgeois liberal class that regards the unalloyed expression of national interest with haughty disdain.
Nevertheless, for his team in Downing Street, this White Paper was about chasing a headline with supposedly significant proposals which, on even, will make insufficient impact on the uncontrolled migration flow to Britain.
Having firmly supported Britain taking back control of immigration, I regard the proposals outlined in the White Paper as being short of ambition and scant on detail.
The biggest loophole of them all is absent from their proposal — asylum claims from people who entered the UK on legal visas. In 2024, 69 percent of visa-linked asylum claims were from these categories. Notably, these stem from student and work visas. In most cases, conditions in their home country have not apparently changed, so it’s clear these individuals are gaming a system that’s not fit for purpose.
The idea that a claim for asylum can be made long after arrival in the UK makes a mockery of the very principle of providing refuge to someone “fleeing” persecution.
The absurdity continues as applicants are able to remain in the UK endlessly while their applications are being processed. Ironically, Labour, having flatly rejected the Rwanda scheme for offshore processing of asylum seekers, are now seeking a feasible alternative.
Rather than, as the Government is inclined to, funding drones over Albania, and paying the Italians to manage paperwork, our Parliament could legislate to authorise extraterritorial processing, perhaps in somewhere like Rwanda, designating it as a “processing zone” under domestic law. It would be costly and require political courage, but such is the price of restoring integrity to our broken immigration system.
It would also act as a deterrent to those who plan to arrive illegally by boat — not that the Government seems genuinely interested in cracking down on this. The fact is that under this Government, migrant crossings and the use of hotels to accommodate those arriving illegally have soared. Over 20,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel since Labour assumed office.
The British taxpayer now spends approximately £4.5 million a day on hotels despite Labour’s pre-election pledge to end the use of hotels for illegal migrants.
As for the Prime Minister’s much-hyped “Border Security Command”, the overall cost of establishing and operating this has never been publicly disclosed. What we do know, however, is that its effectiveness is dependent upon international collaboration. Hitherto, such partnerships have been proved largely ineffective or lacked a proper deterrence.
Two months ago the French Government finally agreed to change the law to allow police officers to intercept migrant boats in shallow waters. Before this, officers were not able to intervene a boat once it had been launched. In other words, it was plain sailing for people smugglers.
For those who argue that small boat crossings are insignificant in the scheme of Britain’s net migration number, consider this. We are not even halfway through 2025 and, already, migrant crossings have exceeded 10,000 — a 40 percent increase compared with the same period last year. Surely no Government should choose to ignore this category of migration.
Perhaps the most persuasive arguments for tackling Britain’s overreliance on low-skilled foreign workers. It is a structural economic challenge which results in British firms underinvesting in recruiting and retaining homegrown talent. Why invest in developing the skills of a British worker, when a firm can hire a migrant who costs less? The availability of cheap foreign labour has produced a low-skill, high-employment economy, that involves a cycle of low wages and minimal innovation. It depresses productivity in the UK economy.
The White Paper concedes that GDP per capita has flatlined since 2022 despite record migration, implying that increases in headline growth are driven by sheer population size, not productivity.
It is reasonable to be highly sceptical about Labour’s intention to reduce immigration
Britain must reduce its dependency on labour from overseas to begin investing in its own human capital. The fact that over 13 percent of UK residents aged 16 to 24 are not in education, employment, or training, is cause enough for the Government to act on worklessness if we are to become a productive, high-tech, and high-skilled economy fit to compete worldwide.
While the White Paper does propose to close new recruitment in social care and raise skills thresholds, the Government still intended to permit continued employment visas and renewals for existing low-skilled migrants.
In order to avoid mass disruption in the social care sector, the Government should start investing at scale in the adult social care workforce, for these are lowly-paid, taxing jobs.
It is reasonable to be highly sceptical about Labour’s intention to reduce immigration knowing that the Prime Minister has long been a defender in migrants’ rights; voted against measures that were designed to deter an influx of migrants; and has opposed calls for Britain to leave the ECHR. Watch his deeds, not his words.
