Keir Starmer defends asylum in conference speech, but tells BBC he wants a review of application of international instruments
In a wide-ranging, hour-long speech to the Labour Party conference in Liverpool yesterday, Prime Minister Keir Starmer made no immigration policy announcements, but he sought to set out the values underpinning his approach.
The Prime Minister said that while controlling immigration is a "reasonable goal", there is a moral boundary beyond which anti-migrant sentiment becomes racism. Starmer warned that those who cross that line by stoking hatred or targeting settled minority communities are "enemies of national renewal."
With Reform UK leading in the opinion polls, the Prime Minister told the Labour conference that Reform's leader Nigel Farage was among those who had crossed the line. Ahead of the conference, the Prime Minister told the BBC that Reform's proposals to retrospectively remove indefinite leave to remain and deport non-EU migrants from the UK were 'racist and immoral'.
In his speech, Starmer positioned his government's approach as a middle ground between unchecked migration and hardline policies. He said that controlling who enters the country "is an essential task of government" and that secure borders are "a reasonable demand."
Drawing a distinction between legitimate immigration control policies and racism, he told the conference: "If you say or imply that people cannot be English or British because of the colour of their skin, that mixed heritage families owe you an explanation, and that people who have lived here for generations, raised their children here, built lives in their communities, working in our schools, our hospitals, running businesses, our neighbours, if you say they should now be deported, then mark my words, we will fight you with everything we have, because you are an enemy of national renewal."
The Prime Minister had more to say about his approach to immigration when speaking to the BBC this morning. He outlined plans to review how UK courts interpret international human rights law, including the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), to prevent unsuccessful asylum seekers from avoiding deportation.
Keir Starmer told BBC Radio 4: "I do think we need to look again at the interpretation of some of these provisions, and we've already begun to do that work, … in some of our domestic legislation. We do need to look at that. … It's Article 3 or Article 8. They're the two that are most immediately in place.
"But it's more than that—it's the refugee conventions, the torture conventions, and the convention on the rights of the children. I'm not going to tear all that down. I believe in those instruments. I believe in the rule of law, and I think they matter.
"But all international instruments, and this is long established, have to be applied in the circumstances as they are now. We're seeing mass migration in a way that we haven't seen in previous years. So I believe that those genuinely fleeing persecution should be afforded asylum, and that is a compassionate act.
"But I equally think we need to look again at the interpretation of some of these provisions. I think there's a difference between someone being deported to summary execution and someone who is simply going somewhere where they don't have the same level of health care, or, for that matter, the same prison conditions. And therefore, I do think we should look at issues like that again. I think there's quite an appetite to examine these issues further.
"What I don't think is right is to pull these instruments down, not least because very many other countries would then not do deals like return deals with us or law enforcement deals with us, and therefore it would be completely self-defeating."
The section on immigration from the Prime Minister's full speech to the Labour conference yesterday is reproduced below:
Keir Starmer
[…]
Because while we must come together to fight Reform, with everything that this movement has. We must go into that battle armed, not just with words and condemnation, but with action. And that means tackling all the problems that they prey upon, all the problems.
Soon after I became an MP, I went to Oldham for the byelection there. I was taken to a street to meet a woman who I was told had strong views on immigration. I knocked on the door. She invited me in. We had a cup of tea and a rich tea biscuit. And then, as we sat there she got out her photo album and showed me pictures of her at the wedding of her Asian neighbour. She was proud that she was her neighbour and her friend.
Now – I'm not the most patient person, as my family will tell you. I started thinking – what is going on here. And then we finally got to it. And she told me that a group of men from Eastern Europe had recently moved into her street. They sat on her wall, didn't put the rubbish out at the right time, and spat on the ground. To her that broke the little but important rules of her street. She didn't like it.
Then I realised what was really happening. And conference – what was really happening. Is that she – an ordinary, working class, woman in Oldham, a Labour voter, felt that she had to prove to a Labour politician that she wasn't racist before she could even bring up the issues in her community.
Now – I carried that story with me through all the bad years, conference. Whatever our intentions – we had become a party that patronised working people, and that is why we changed the party. Yet conference there are still some people who cannot listen in good faith on this issue, who say we can ignore the crisis in our asylum system so long as we get the economy moving. I have to say to those people very directly, we'll tackle this issue.
The British people are not unreasonable. They are pragmatic, compassionate and tolerant. That's who we are. What people want from politics – that hasn't changed. They want more cash in their pocket, safer streets, opportunities for their children, and an NHS that is fit for the future. And yes – they want secure borders. And that is a reasonable demand.
Now we should always say plainly – and with pride, that asylum for people genuinely fleeing persecution is the mark of a decent, compassionate country. But conference, conference, secure borders are also vital for a decent, compassionate country. Controlling who comes here is an essential task of government. And there's nothing compassionate or progressive in a vile trade that loads people into overcrowded boats, puts them in grave danger in the Channel, and ultimately exploits human desperation and hope.
So mark my words we will stop this. We will smash the gangs. We will crack down on illegal working. We will remove people with no right to be here. And we will secure Britain's borders. But there is a line – a moral line. And it isn't just Farage who crosses it. There are also people who should know better, sowing fear and discord across our country. And then – when we call it out, they pretend we're criticising reasonable concerns about immigration. We've seen that trick, conference.
So let us spell it out – once and for all. Controlling migration is a reasonable goal. But if you throw bricks and smash up private property, that's not legitimate – that's thuggery. Free speech is a British value – and we have guarded it for centuries. But if you incite racist violence and hatred, that's not expressing concern – it's criminal. This party, this great party, is proud of our flags. Yet if they are painted alongside graffiti telling a Chinese takeaway owner to "go home", that's not pride – that's racism.
And if you say or imply that people cannot be English or British because of the colour of their skin, that mixed heritage families owe you an explanation, and that people who have lived here for generations, raised their children here, built lives in their communities, working in our schools, our hospitals, running businesses, our neighbours, if you say they should now be deported, then mark my words, we will fight you with everything we have, because you are an enemy of national renewal. And it will be a fight, conference.