UK Politics

Tens of thousands of people who have legally settled in Britain could be at risk of deportation under plans by Reform UK to scrap the main route towards British citizenship – a policy that was immediately dismissed as “an unworkable stunt based on dodgy maths”.Nigel Farage said the current option of indefinite leave to remain – open to those who have lived and worked in Britain for five years – has “betrayed democracy” and vowed to abolish it.The plans were condemned by migration charities and think tanks, as well as the care industry, which warned of crippling labour shortages.Doubt was also cast over Mr Farage’s claim that savings from the policy would be “considerably larger” than the £230bn once suggested by the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), despite the think tank having since said its figure should no longer be used.And despite the Reform leader’s claims the proposals would cut Britain’s welfare bill, it has emerged that EU citizens would be exempted from plans to ban all migrants from receiving benefits. This means only 2.7 per cent of universal credit claimants would be affected by Reform’s clampdown.Nigel Farage makes his bold announcement at a press conference in London on Monday More

More welfare reforms “must happen”, the new work and pensions secretary has said, refusing to rule out further changes to universal credit in the near future.Pat McFadden said he was “not ruling anything out” when asked about future benefit cuts, adding that “welfare reform is really important”.“At the moment, this system is unhealthy for people and in the long run is pushing up the benefits bill because we’re not getting the help to people who could work,” he told the BBC.The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) chief did not rule out speculated benefit changes such as tightening eligibility for universal credit, or restricting its health element until age 22.Changes to the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) are currently on hold until after the conclusion of a review by disability minister Sir Stephen Timms. The benefit was at the centre of Labour’s proposed £4bn in welfare cuts earlier this year, until fierce criticism and a backbench rebellion forced ministers to partly relent on the plans. Changes to the rate of universal credit’s health element – recently criticised by the UN – will still come into effect from next April.New DWP secretary Pat McFadden has refused to rule out several changes to universal credit More

Working people are being asked to change their habits to combat the climate crisis, while the government is targeting hundreds of thousands of new flights a year with Gatwick and Heathrow expansions, Zack Polanski has said. The new leader of the Green Party dubbed the decision to approve a second runway at Gatwick Airport “deeply irresponsible”, telling The Independent that Labour is “pretending to care about reducing emissions”. “In places like London, we’re rightly asking people to change their habits around the way they drive, but we’re still subsidising aviation fuel. And I think people will see the contradictions”, he said.Zack Polanski, leader of the Green Party, criticised the decision to approve a second runway at Gatwick Airport More

A research manager who moved from Brazil to the UK has said Nigel Farage’s plan to abolish indefinite leave to remain (ILR) would make it impossible to plan a future in this country.Brener Seixas, who works in London, pays taxes through his above-average salary while volunteering for a housing association cooperative in Lewisham. He also runs a Brazilian film festival, which takes place next month.Despite having lived in the UK for four years, the 34-year-old, who is preparing to apply for ILR status in March, said Reform UK’s radical policy on immigrants had left him feeling insecure about his future. At a press conference on Monday morning, Mr Farage announced officially that his party, which is ahead of Labour in some opinion polls, would abolish ILR and force non-EU migrants to renew their visa every five years. Under the crackdown, which Mr Farage claimed would save £234bn through welfare and housing, applicants would have to meet certain criteria, including a higher salary threshold and a better standard of English. Those with UK citizenship status would not be affected.However, the plan has been met with an outcry from charities, campaigners and politicians, as well as those who would be affected, including Mr Seixas.Follow updated reaction to Reform’s migration plans – click here for our live blogBrener Seixas arrived in the UK from Brazil and now works as a research manager More

Welfare benefits for UK citizens only under Reform, Farage saysNigel Farage has been warned his controversial plans to introduce stricter rules for legal migrants will spark “tear families apart”.The Reform UK leader says he wants to abolish indefinite leave to remain after five years and force applicants to renew their visa every five years.The party said the proposals would “lead to hundreds of thousands of people having to apply and ultimately losing their settled status in the UK.”But campaigners have branded the “Trump-style plan” as unconscionably cruel”. “You only have to look to the US to see how this kind of policy can play out where masked gangs are abducting people in the street and tearing families apart,” Naomi Smith, chief executive of Best for Britain, said.“Reform’s Trump-style plan to deport thousands of people from the UK who have the legal right to be here, and who even may have been here for decades, would not only be economically devastating but unconscionably cruel.”Chancellor Rachel Reeves has said the plans had no basis in reality, while the mayor of London Sadiq Khan called them unacceptable.‘Britain is my home – but Farage’s new plan has me fearing for my future’The Independent’s Alex Ross reports:Brener Seixas, who works in London, pays taxes through his above-average salary while volunteering for a housing association cooperative in Lewisham. He also runs a Brazilian film festival, which takes place next month.Despite having lived in the UK for four years, the 34-year-old, who is preparing to apply for ILR status in March, said Reform UK’s radical policy on immigrants had left him feeling insecure about his future.He told The Independent: “The proposals to scrap ILR, and force people like me to reapply repeatedly for the right to stay, don’t just change the rules on paper – they make me feel like a guest who can be asked to leave at any time, no matter how much I’ve invested in this country.”Brener Seixas arrived in the UK from Brazil, and now works as a research manager, contributing to the UK through taxes on his income and voluntary work with a housing association More

Reform UK has said it could deport hundreds of thousands of legal migrants from the UK and severely tighten the rules for people looking to migrate to the country under new plans unveiled by Nigel Farage. Sharing disputed figures that claim the policy would save more than £200bn, the party said that, if it comes to power, it would scrap indefinite leave to remain (ILR), the main route by which migrants are able to settle in the UK and which is open to people who have worked and lived in the UK legally for five years. Reform claimed the plans would undo the “Boris wave” of migrants ushered in by the former Conservative prime minister. This refers to around 800,000 migrants who came to the UK under “relaxed” post-Brexit migration rules introduced by Boris Johnson’s government, and who will soon begin to qualify for permanent residence. Mr Farage claimed this group were “going to be a huge burden on the state”.It is unclear where the alleged savings of more than £200bn will come from and how they have been calculated More

Zarah Sultana has said she will call off legal action in a move of reconciliation in her bitter feud with Jeremy Corbyn over their fledgling party.In a statement, the left-wing MP said she would put the argument behind her “for the sake of the party” and acknowledged that supporters felt “demoralised” over the row engulfing Your Party, which she established with Mr Corbyn. Earlier this week Ms Sultana claimed she faced a “sexist boys’ club” amid a furious row over the party’s membership system. Last Thursday, supporters were urged to officially sign up and give the party financial backing – but this was later described by Mr Corbyn as an “unauthorised email”. Hours later, he warned people not to sign up to the link. On Friday Ms Sultana said she had instructed “specialist defamation lawyers” after she was “the subject of a number of false and defamatory statements” about her launch of the membership system.But in a post on Sunday night, Ms Sultana said she was “determined to reconcile” and was in talks with Mr Corbyn.“For the sake of the party, and as an act of good faith, I will not be pursuing legal proceedings despite the baseless and unsubstantiated allegations against me,” she wrote in a statement posted on X. “Fascism is growing at the door. The stakes are too high for failure to be an option.”Zarah Sultana, MP for Coventry South, has promised reconciliation with Jeremy Corbyn More

Cigarette-style health warnings should be placed on social media apps to protect children from harm, the Liberal Democrats will say.In a drive to make the internet safer for young people, the party also wants to introduce a “doomscrolling cap” which would prevent their social media feeds from endlessly providing new content.Victoria Collins, the Lib Dem science and technology spokesperson, will lay out the plans in a speech at the party’s conference in Bournemouth on Monday.“If we are going to take on this multibillion-pound industry we need to be brave,” she will tell the conference.Ms Collins will add: “We have long recognised that where online content poses a threat to public health, we need to know. That’s why I’m calling today for addictive social media apps to come with mandatory health warnings for under-18s.“Just like cigarettes or alcohol, these addictive products carry well-documented risks, especially for young people.“The evidence is clear that excessive use of these apps exposes children to mental health issues, to anxiety, sleep disruption and to real harm to attention spans. Don’t they deserve to know that?”The intervention into the field of protecting children on social media comes after party leader Sir Ed Davey continued his spat with tech boss Elon Musk.Sir Ed has called for Ofcom to investigate Mr Musk’s X platform for allowing images of child abuse and self-harm instructions to proliferate.The US-based businessman has been critical of Sir Keir Starmer’s Government for introducing the Online Safety Act, aimed at protecting children online, but which Mr Musk says has a chilling effect on free speech.Sir Ed is expected to attack Mr Musk in his conference speech on Tuesday.His party’s science spokesperson Ms Collins also turned up the heat on the Government for not going far enough to defend children from harmful online content.She said: “Peter Kyle, until recently the science secretary, has mooted time caps or curfews on addictive social apps – but moves on to another department leaving behind a record of failure.“The Government must finally deliver and introduce a doomscroll ban, that caps the amount of time children can spend on these addictive apps.”Polling commissioned by the Lib Dems ahead of the tech-focused speech found 80% of parents of school-aged children have reported at least one negative behaviour in young people because of excessive phone usage.The poll, carried out by Savanta, interviewed a representative sample of 611 UK parents of school-aged children online between August 22 and 26. More