Starmer tried to look tough by calling Reform's policies racist this week.
I have already noted their backlash this morning.
But let's also be clear, if Starmer is bandying the word around, then it has to be applied to him and his policies as well. Take this from the Guardian this morning, which I have no doubt is reliably reported just as Labour would wish it to be:
People granted asylum will no longer be given “the golden ticket” of resettlement and family reunion rights, Keir Starmer said, amid deepening concerns from charities that his words are demonising refugees.
As the prime minister prepared to discuss illegal migration with European leaders, No 10 outlined plans to strip successful claimants of the right to automatically invite spouses and children to join them.
The right to permanently settle in the UK will be bestowed upon those who prove to be contributing to society, he said, “not by paying a people-smuggler to cross the Channel in a boat”.
Under current rules, successful asylum seekers have the right to invite family members to join them and settle in the UK.
There was no "golden ticket" in the policy Labour now wants to abandon. There was just the fundamental, long-established right to a family life in UK law, which Starmer now wants to overturn. Doing so is racist in the way he is proposing it.
Also note that in the process of doing this, he is claiming that UK citizens are superhumans and that migrants are subhuman, without the rights that the superhumans have. This, of course, also makes this a fascist policy.
If we must call things as they are, and Starmer seems to think we should, these things need to be pointed out.
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And what people don’t realise is these hostile laws apply to those who fall in love with someone who isn’t British and try and bring them over here. A former neighbour worked in Zimbabwe and fell in love and married. When she brought her new husband over here under a legitimate visa which he had to reapply for at great cost annually he was unable to buy a house or be named on the deeds of the house bought solely under his wife’s name. He had to pay an NHS surcharge despite working full time and paying taxes. It was expensive and humiliating and by the time he got to apply for indefinite leave to remain he had two British children, had paid thousands in visa fees and taxes as he was working full time. His citizenship came through just before Covid and I noticed a difference in how he was as it gave him security and freedom. This was a loyal hard working person who I like and respect, who had already suffered a lot from the Zimbabwean regime. He has already contributed a lot and quite rightly wants his children to gain a good education and flourish. Do we really want to punish and exclude such people?
Noted
And I think you know where I stand.
Totally, but it’s this othering that is always done without understanding the consequences. And my former neighbour is always now highlighting othering as we live in a Devon village and her mixed race children encounter all sorts of othering and racism. Her daughter’s best friend told her her afro hair is weird. This saddened me as this child is the daughter of a mutual friend who I expected better of, and such behaviour has to be nipped in the bud. It might seem innocent but the affect on the receiver is not. I would never have dreamed of saying this when I grew up in London in the 60s and 70s.
Important to highlight this.
Presumably there are many people who want asylum and are more than willing to “contribute to society” but who are held in accommodation whilst waiting for their claim to be assessed, and are not allowed to work, i.e. are not allowed to contribute to society? Starmer gets worse and worse. Can he not sack his advisers?
“Can he not sack his advisors”
Better yet, he should resign.
I think Starmer is the puppet rather than the puppet master.
Craig
Observable policies that advocate exclusion and actively increase the amount of discrimination in the UK. Check. On a scale of 1 to 10, I put Starmer as a 4, Farage a 7, Corbyn a 2. Charles Kennedy 1. He made it clear that the Conservatives were soft on racism and soft on the causes of racism back in 2001. He would be saying the same about Starmer. I have no doubt about that. Same old same old. Labour a disappointment, Tories a disaster.
No steer, is using the Trump line, claiming that the ECHR plus UK Human Rights laws stops the UK deporting failed migrant applicants to states where they “might be imprisoned”, not just the state that they were born in.
Trump is happy to throw out citizens who have rights to live in the USA for example deporting Argentinians to the appalling El Salvador prison system.
All to show how “tough” he is.
I would like to think that at some point, Starmer had some common decency about him.
Unfortunately, something happens to weak people like him when they get some authority. It goes to their heads, and they start listening only to the people who advise them in one direction. They also stop listening to anyone who disagrees with them, hence the draconian measures against Labour MPs who vote with their consciences.
I met Tony Blair when he was Leader of the Opposition. I used to serve him his breakfast on the train. He always had kippers.
At that time I genuinely believed that his heart was in the right place. Nowadays he doesn’t even have a heart.
The trappings of power get to most of them in the end.
I can’t see Blair as a kippers person.
More kedgeree.
I seem to remember he only had kippers on the train because his wife didn’t like him eating them at home.
Much like my late father with tripe!
🙂
That crass ‘Golden Ticket’ phrase screamed out to be questioned on R4 BBC this morning , but of course it wasn’t. Was it the same script writer who brought us ‘island of strangers’?
These Starmer dog whistle phrases – are just feeding the monster ‘migrants are the cause of all your ills’ that Farage and the Tories created .
Of course he’s not racist – he has just decided to utter racist phrases, and sound racist in a doomed attempt to try to stay in power .
Uttering racist phrases make you a racist.
Trying to be ironic
“By going to unthinkable extremes, they can pull the mythical “middle” toward the far edge, normalizing and “mainstreaming” radical Republican positions that are anything but neutral.”
https://www.theframelab.org/wheres-the-middle-ground-between/
written about the US but applies to the effect of Reform on Labour in the UK.
If supposed progressives chase the middle then they can be manipulated into supporting the unacceptable and using the language associated with that and language matters. Someone in his position using the wrong language normalises it and strengthens the notions associated with it in peoples minds. Whether he truly believes it deep down or is just saying it to chase Reform votes doesn’t really matter.
Alternatively & simpler, if it quacks like a racist then it’s indistinguishable from a racist
That quote from ?Tony Benn the other day about gov’t’s doing to immigrants what they really want to do to most of us…
The “humans” in Starmer’s strategy are those “contributing” (he means those who do paid “work”).
The “SUB-humans” are those NOT contributing, such as the chronically sick or disabled or long term unemployed, who also do not apparently have the same rights as the rest of us.
Today’s noisy immigration dogwhistle is racist, and racist dogs will respond to it.
But there is another whistle being blown, not racist but fascist. Only those who “contribute” deserve to eat, to have a secure warm home, to be part of a functioning society, to be educated and kept safe. That really nasty fascist whistle (hanging from a DWP lanyard), is currently in the custody of Pat MacFadden, and when it gets blown, not so many people make a fuss about it. He too made a v nasty speech this week from the DWP podium.
Because his whistle isn’t being blown to beat Fa***e, it’s being blown because Labour genuinely, just like the Tories, or perhaps worse, despise those who don’t “contribute”, and they know they can mostly get away with it, because most of the public haven’t got a clue about what it’s like to be in that situation. After all, “it’s in the party name” said a minister this week. “Labour is not the party for those on benefits” said another, not too long ago. The policy of “workfare” (the Job Guarantee, or “slave Labour” as it used to be called, is once again on the agenda).
There are pragmatic economic arguments to defend the benefits of immigration.
But it requires a genuine commitment to our shared humanity to defend the rights of those who do not (economically) “contribute”.
Such principled people are hard to find, and there are only a small minority left in our legislature, and none at all in the Cabinet. We have a moral crisis.
KUTGW!
You would happily have open borders and let anyone reside here. That doesn’t work for the majority of the electorate. You have to accept this. And it is wrong to call anyone who doesn’t share your opinion racist.
Why doesnt it work though?
Please tell me. Precisely. What is the problem, and I stress, not the fiction, the problem?
“Why doesnt it work”
Well there is a housing shortage for the population as it is at present. The NHS can’t cope with the population at present. And we have near 25% of the adult working population on benefits. I could go on. No developed country has open and unfettered borders like you suggest. Yes we need skills added to our labour market but unfettered migration is not the answer. And i repeat it is just ridiculous to call those who disagree with you racist.
Migrants could build houses.
The NHS could cope – it just needs more people. Many migrants work for the NHS.
And how would migrants stpp people claiming benefits? That beats me…please explain (I am one, by the way: most of the people you refer to are OAPs – do you want to abolish the state pension?)
And we had unfettered borders in my lifetime.
So, please answer the questions.
My point with 25% of the population claiming benefits there must be some productivity in there particularly with youth unemployment. My point is we are not short of labour. And yes skilled migrants to fit our shortcomings make sense but do you think wave after wave of migrants into the south west coast is the best way to achieve this?
First, I was not aware the southwest was suffering many immigrant arrivals. Do you mean the south east?
Second, those coming on boats are less than 5% of the total. So, let’s talk the 95% with visas. What are you saying about them, all of whom arrive with an open welcome?
25% of the population claim benefits because wages are too low, they are pensioners, they are disabled, rents are excessive, they have children, and so on. My mum claimed child benefit throughout my childhood. I remember the book. I bet your mum might have done too. It does not mean they are unemployed – a cause of under 5% of payments.
And amongst the young, the causes of ill health are systemic – and most often becuase the employment system has rejected them e.g. because they are neuordiverse, and they become depressed, withdrawn, anxious and so on. Large numbers of graduates are in this situation, for example. Is that their fault?
I look forward to your answers.
Your opener, “You would…” is a bit of a give-away.
It works better if you say, “I would… ” or even better
“What would you…?”.
Try it sometime.
Have a read of this, I found it fascinating.
https://www.ethnicity-facts-figures.service.gov.uk/work-pay-and-benefits/benefits/state-support/latest/
The 51% figure in the stats includes pensioners and those receving child benefit. Presumably you were a child once and hope to be a pensioner. Take them out and we are looking at a figure of around 21%.
The report shows that of the different ethnic groups, the ethnic group with the highest proportion claiming any sort of state support are the White British – of whom 54% are claiming it (the lowest being Chinese) and they are mostly on NON-income related benefits.
What I can’t see in your rhetoric (because it IS rhetoric), is any factual analysis or any suggestions. You don’t really say what “the problem” is.
Is it the overall DWP spend you are worried about? Why?
Or is it immigration? Again, why?
Are you concerned FOR them, or ABOUT them?
Is it low pay that bothers you, or something else?
Is it those in small boats that bother you or those who come with visas?
What are the problems facing UK citizens, for which small boat arrivals are the cause? (please provide verified statistics)
What IS the problem you want dealt with (because you haven’t defined it)?
The stats also distinguish between income related and contribution related benefits. Interesting to see which ethnic groups are in the lowest paid jobs – earning too little to live on. I wonder why that is, and what we could do about it?
The ethnicity stats don’t support the idea of a benefits problem caused by “wave after wave” of immigrants arriving on the south “west” (sic) coast. But don’t tell GBNews that, because their version of the story floats free, untethered by facts – a bit like yours.
Many thanks
Before I started school we had immigrants living in our large house along with us. They had meals with us, worked for the NHS as doctors and nurses, and mainly came from Nigeria or Jamaica, although there was a German family in the 50s, two school-age kids, she was a nurse and he worked on the buses. Nobody would have dared make racist remarks in front of my parents when they were at work.
Why and when did it all change?
We wanted people to work here then, we needed the infrastructure to be rebuilt. I was born in Hull. It was one of the worst cities bombed by Germany, but not all Germans were Nazis.
Thank you
I nearly fell off my chair when I read that Guardian article this morning. I expect Starmer to be a pillock but it takes a whole other level of bad for him to criticise Farage in a speech and then less than 24 hours later decide some hateful, anti-family policy should be applied to immigration as though people not born in the UK are somehow different and void of emotion.
I think Starmer lost any hope of my tactical vote again some time ago but even so I hope some of his colleagues start giving more thought to the future of their party when liberals like me see no point in tactically voting for them to keep Farage out any more.
Agreed
I’d like to thank Graham for popping in, it is really useful. And I’m not being rude or sarcastic or anything. It is really useful to see his sort of thinking. It does show us what is going on.
Richard made the point about numbers of people – and the numbers of immigrants will include the qualified people we need because of stupid self imposed austerity where we cut college places for vocational courses (building and trades) for our young people.
Where wages are so crap, many people go abroad to work; where people don’t want to wipe old people’s bottoms on minimum wage and less; where people don’t want to become nurses because rents are too expensive and nursing accommodation gets sold off into the private sector under the guise of ‘efficiency’. So, immigrants are needed to fill the gap – many of whom come from places where life is different and the wages we find to be poor are perhaps better than what they have come from.
So Richard has talked about numbers – I’m going to shout up for the other problem that is similar to numbers – that is called ‘money’, where the numbers continue to be too low to be useful and piss people off to the point where they think Nigel Farage is the answer.
Until this blasted country of ours loses its Thatcherite addiction to not paying a decent sum for stuff, people will continue to get upset and fall prey to bullshit about immigration.
This is a rich country dominated by people struggling to live, with bent politicians pretending they can do nothing about it but who are quite happy to put their hands in their pockets to bail out private banks, give a free line of credit as the banks fail anyway called the Central Bank Reserve Account. The politicians are also happy to see markets rip people off for water, coffee, anything.
What people like Graham need to do is go and look at what is happening and find out for themselves. You have no excuse because the evidence that money is being deliberately withheld from society is all around you to the point where your comments can only be interpreted one way.
And that is that you and those like you ARE racists.
Your ignorance makes you so.
Thanks
Apologies for commenting again.
The other Graham is a social conservative, of the type encouraged by Thatcher, and, let’s be honest, every British Prime Minister since, to a greater or lesser degree.
People who put themselves front and centre of everything, with others, especially those less fortunate, blamed for their own position in life, or lack of it.
Sadly a lot of these people make their way into politics, and are largely to blame for the state of today’s world, in my opinion.
Fellow citizens are surprising me with their hostility to other human beings. Some of it is racism, but most of it is an alarming decline in empathy, mainly from people who are doing alright, and have enough to live on fairly comfortably. We used to call this ‘I’m alright, Jack’ , prevalent in Thatcher’s days as PM. This lack of humanity saddens me, but you cannot make people care who don’t. I blame politicians for setting a poor example over the last 30 odd years.
Starmer should know better. By constantly referring to Farage and raising the spectre of Reform, he is succeeding in reminding everyone of its presence and in copying (to a significant extent) its would-be policies Labour becomes but a pale imitation. Starmer should do the opposite; praise the historic and continuing contributions of immigrants, tell people that immigration has been a positive force for good and growth (which is what Labour says it wants) and are badly needed by the nation. Instead Labour is rolling immigrants into one incoherent ‘other’ and make the word immigrant a label of discrimination. How can we be a free and equal society if some among us are second class citizens who are expected to wait 10 years to become full ones? Labour is in danger of becoming as racially motivated as Reform.
Starmer is playing on Farage’s pitch.
He can never win by doing that.
Starmer heads a Government that has a gaping void in the place where vision, purpose and coherence should live. Hence his increasingly rapid about turns, his political ineptitude and growing authoritarianism. Hence the rhetoric to make him appear “strong”. Genuine leaders are content to devolve power. Not he. Attacking the weak:
https://www.disabilitynewsservice.com/activist-tells-conference-meeting-hostile-rhetoric-under-labour-has-left-me-feeling-hounded-and-unsafe/
“The rhetoric surrounding people who require support because of ill-health has become positively threatening.
“It has been encouraged tacitly by the government.
“It dehumanises people who can’t work and there has been not one shred of fightback by the government about the knock-on effects of their rhetoric.”
Thbank you for noting this.
And that, I know, is how people do feel.
Keir Starmer 28 Sep:
“I do think it [Reform on immigration] is a racist policy. I do think it’s immoral and it’s to be called out for what it is.”
Keir Starmer 1 Oct:
“I’m not going to go down the road of discussing whether things said by others are racist or not”
Inconsistency is his theme.
The only consistent thing about Starmer is his inconsistency.
The Labour party _says_ it is not racist, but when confronted with any kind of challenges by racists, it conceeds to them.
Separating family members as currently proposed under the new visa arrangements must be music to the traffickers’ ears. Their contracts are being renewed! One example of Labour supporting small businesses – I suppose.