Green party leader Zack Polanski (Green Party of England and Wales). Image: Bristol Green Party Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
“Keir Starmer today said this country has been too ‘squeamish’ about talking about immigration. Let’s call that for what it is: bullshit. The truth is, politicians have talked about little else for decades and almost always in the most toxic, dehumanising way possible. These comments are lapped up and regurgitated on a near-daily basis as talking points without any real balance.
That phrase “stop the boats” is all we hear. Well, today I am saying “stop the bullshit”.
It’s time to be honest. It’s what we deserve. Immigration is not the crisis. The NHS is not crumbling because of tiny numbers of desperate people clinging on to small boats. The crisis is a political class too cowardly to tackle the actual huge issues of poverty, housing, and low pay. Too eager to distract us by pointing the finger at people who come here to contribute to our communities and our economy.”
Keir Starmer refuses to be outcnuted by Nigel Farage’s chasing the racist bigot vote.
“The prime minister has decided to use divisive language lifted straight out of Reform’s playbook. These ill-thought-through reforms are the triumph of a panicked and misguided rush to create headlines and try to win back Reform voters.
“From closed down youth centres to shuttered pubs, people in all parts of the UK are feeling the bonds that hold their communities together dissolving. And whether it’s rebuilding intergenerational relationships, or helping those who come here from abroad to integrate, strengthening those bonds requires support and crucially funding from central government. But far from rebuilding our communities, this government’s reforms are going to make things worse.
“In particular, at a time when the care sector is already stretched to breaking point, and public support for people coming from overseas to work in our care sector is consistently strong, it’s wild that this government is ignoring public opinion and making it even harder to recruit badly-needed care staff.”
By pandering to racist representations of immigration and failing to explain it as the inevitable consequence of colonialism, empire and the neoliberal global order, Starmer now shares an ideological position with Nigel Farage.
The plan to end licensed immigration by people contracted to work in the care sector will intensify the crisis in the NHS and make life miserable for people in care.
Care sector employers are upset because it hits their supply of cheap labour and thus their profits.
This illustrates a feature of 21st century immigration into capitalist countries that disrupts both Farage’s narrative and Labour’s imitation of the same.
A migration-enlarged labour force increases precisely those profits — the unpaid wages that employers retain — that would be diminished if they were compelled to train locals and pay them enough to attract a sufficient supply of labour.
A sensible strategy would be to attack Farage for his support for privatisation, his opposition to employment rights, his fawning over Trump and his works, his willingness to flog off the NHS to US corporations.
The most productive approach would be to stand up for what most Reform UK voters want and which they share with most people in our country — public ownership, higher taxes on the rich and an end to the privileges of the plutocracy.
The family of Mahmoud Khalil released a video of his March 8, 2025 arrest by U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents in New York City. (Photo: screen grab/Family of Mahmoud Khalil)
Khalil’s wife said that “officers in plain clothes—who refused to show us a warrant, speak with our attorney, or even tell us their names—forced my husband into an unmarked car and took him away from me.”
The family of Mahmoud Khalil, a legal permanent resident of the United States now at risk of deportation because he helped lead pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University last spring, on Friday released a video of his recent arrest by U.S. Department of Homeland Security agents in New York City, which has sparked legal battles and protests.
“You’re watching the most terrifying moment of my life,” Khalil’s wife, Noor, said in a statement about the two-minute video. “This felt like a kidnapping because it was: Officers in plain clothes—who refused to show us a warrant, speak with our attorney, or even tell us their names—forced my husband into an unmarked car and took him away from me.”
“Everyone should be alarmed and urgently calling for the freedom of Mahmoud and all other students under attack for their advocacy for Palestinian human rights.”
“They threatened to take me too, even though we were calm and fully cooperating. For the next 38 hours after this video, neither I or our lawyers knew where Mahmoud was being held. Now, he’s over 1,000 miles from home, still being wrongfully detained by U.S. immigration,” said Noor, whose husband is detained at a facility in Jena, Louisiana.
Noor, who is eight months pregnant, noted that “Mahmoud has repeatedly warned of growing threats from Columbia University and the U.S. government unjustly targeting students who want to see an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Now, the Trump administration and DHS are targeting him, and other students too.”
“Mahmoud is clearly the first of many to be illegally repressed for their speech in support of Palestinian rights,” she added. “Everyone should be alarmed and urgently calling for the freedom of Mahmoud and all other students under attack for their advocacy for Palestinian human rights.”
BREAKING: Family of Mahmoud Khalil releases footage from the night of his arrest.
Make no mistake: This is federal agents in plainclothes dragging a man from his home as punishment for his constitutionally protected speech. pic.twitter.com/X7JVQyAzrm
— The CCR is on bsky (@ccrjustice.org) (@theCCR) March 14, 2025
Khalil, who finished his graduate studies at Columbia in December, is an Algerian citizen of Palestinian descent. He was living in the United States with a green card until his arrest on Saturday. In response to a filing by his legal team—which includes Amy Greer from Dratel & Lewis, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and the Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility (CLEAR) project—a judge has temporarily blocked his deportation.
The ACLU and its New York arm have joined Khalil’s legal team, and his attorneys filed an amended petition and complaint on Thursday. NYCLU executive director Donna Lieberman said that with the new “filing, we are making it crystal clear that no president can arrest, detain, or deport anyone for disagreeing with the government. The Trump administration has selectively targeted Mr. Khalil, a student, husband, and father-to-be who has not been accused of a single crime, to send a message of just how far they will go to crack down on dissent.”
“But we at the NYCLU and ACLU won’t stand for it—under the Constitution, the Trump administration has no basis to continue this cruel weaponization of Mr. Khalil’s life,” Lieberman added. “The court must release Mr. Khalil immediately and let him go home to his family in New York, where he belongs. Ideas are not illegal, and dissent is not grounds for deportation.”
Samah Sisay of CCR reiterated those messages as the arrest video circulated on Friday, saying that “Mr. Khalil was taken by plainclothes DHS agents in front of his pregnant wife without any legal justification. Mr. Khalil must be freed because the government cannot use these coercive tactics to unlawfully suppress his First Amendment protected speech in support of Palestinian rights.”
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A group of people are brought in to Dover, Kent, by the RNLI Dungeness Lifeboat following a small boat incident in the Channel, December 28, 2024
IMMIGRATION rule changes blocking refugees from gaining citizenship are counterproductive and a dark moment in British history, campaigners warned today.
Under the updated Home Office “good character” guidance which took effect on Monday, applicants who entered Britain illegally will “normally” be refused citizenship, regardless of how long they have lived here.
The new rules specifically target those who arrived via dangerous routes, stating: “A person who applies for citizenship from February 10 2025 who has previously arrived without a required valid entry clearance or electronic travel authorisation, having made a dangerous journey, will normally be refused citizenship.”
A dangerous journey, the guidance adds, includes but is not limited to travelling by small boat or being concealed in a vehicle.
The change comes as Labour’s new Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill, which scraps the previous Tory government’s Rwanda plan, passed its first hurdle in the Commons on Monday.
The Bill includes new criminal offences and grants counter-terror-style powers to police and enforcement agencies in a bid to crack down on people-smuggling gangs in the Channel.
