I posted this on Twitter this morning:
Starmer is enabling fascism through his cowardice and acceptance of Farage's framing.
He has power and will not use it to tell the truth.
That is what failure looks like.
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It seems the Government has taken leave of any sense with regard to asylum seekers. This is complete capitulation to the right wing with its total ludicrousness and pointlessness.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/aug/30/home-office-bans-asylum-seekers-from-buying-luxury-goods-and-services
“illegal” what does that mean? Asylum – from what? exactly?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morecambe_Bay_cockling_disaster
Were the very unfortunate chinese people killed economic migrants? “illegal immigrants”? “asylum seekers?” what?.
We can say for sure that they were exploited & paid a pittance & some lost their lives.. in the UK.
We know for sure, that the people crossing the channel (boats or containers) will have a range of reason (with I guess desparation a key element).
What makes the Uk so attractive? Is the +/- 50k such a big deal?
There seems to be far too much piss & wind & politicis talked on the subject – & not very many facts & even fewer questions asked.
The cockle disaster was posted to show that migration to the UK has been a problem for several decades with no party able to stand back and come up with some sort of solution.
The Bishop of Oxford has taken issue with Reform’s ‘plan’ to put 600,000 in concentration camps and deport them to the Taliban , but fails to nail Badenoch and Starmer who are reinforcing ‘its migrants to blame’ . In othe words he should have called out the policitcal system not just one party.
unlike Jane Martinson :
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/aug/30/press-politicians-debate-refugees-migration-uk
She really nails the ‘unvirtuous circle’ of politicians joining hotel demonstrations and then getting screaming Daily Mail headlines for doing so.
Very good article.
Rowan Williams
former Archbishop of Canterbury wrote in the Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/aug/30/refugees-migrants-hotels-humanity
he ends If we listen a bit harder to some of our migrant voices, we might be clearer about what others think we might have cause to be proud of. And we might start some proper cross-party conversation about what an immigration regime might look like that was committed to the safety and dignity of all the “ordinary” people involved in it.
A better ABoC than most we have had.
Does someone support the status quo?
Or demand radical change?
The status quo is intolerable to anyone with a fuctioning moral conscience.
That’s the test to apply to the Bishop of Oxford et al. IMHO he fails it.
Practically, in the short term, maybe till I die, the short term suits me well enough in material terms. I’m tempted to keep quiet and ride it out. But morally? It is intolerable, and spiritually/emotionally I would go to pieces.
But clearly that isn’t the case for most of those who walk the corridors of power and influence. Are they all so bereft of moral conscience?
If not, how do they survive their constant hypocrisy?
I wish I could answer tht.
And like you, “in the short term, maybe till I die, the short term suits me well enough in material terms. I’m tempted to keep quiet and ride it out. But morally? It is intolerable, and spiritually/emotionally I would go to pieces.”
Agreed.
It’s legally impossible to “enter” the UK illegally.
Starmer as an ex-human rights lawyer, snd ex DPP, knows that.
He knows he is lying.
He knows WHY he is lying.
He does a lot of lying, he lied his way to being LOTO and to being PM.
It IS possible to REMAIN in the UK illegally, after a visa has expired or an asylum claim has been (lawfully) denied or a “right to remain” lawfully revoked. But the Home Office chooses to go for the “low hanging fruit” and focusses on “the boats!, the boats!”, like a Dover-domiciled Quasimodo (an open source quote!).
Starmer can quote no law to support his lies.
Like the Tory rabble who ruled in the UK, until July 2024, his is a lawbreaking government.
Any gutless Labour MP who remains silent about this is preparing us for fascism.
Sadly, there are an awful lot of gutless Labour MPs.
To Labour’s silent cowards – carry on as you are, and Fa***e’s fascists will walk into power in 2029. Is that what you are in politics for?
Agreed
If government had implemented its obligations to asylum seekers with efficiency and care, none of this would be happening. Instead government policy has been solely based on deterrence: provide no safe process, ramp that up and deny the right to work while your claim is being processed, convert hotels rendered no longer viable due to COVID into detention centers. Still coming? Then stop processing claims all together: come here and we’ll leave you to rot. Not enough? Whip up fear and hatred and openly lie.
And all that and more in an attempt to deter enough people to fill two Spurs home games spread over a year.
Very much to agree with.
We could have safe passages.
We could let migrants work whilst they were waiting for their claims to be determined.
The government is choosing to stigmatise people making legal asylum claims and they have a great deal of responsibility for what has happened as a result.
The Tories are particularly heinous in this respect.
Understand Starmer is supposed to have come out of a human rights background under Geoffrey Robertson via his professional life as a barrister. Ask Robertson what he thinks of Starmer (there’s a Guardian article on that https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jul/07/keir-starmer-prime-minister-geoffrey-robertson).
As best I can tell he’s a captive of the neocons in the US State Department. Perhaps like Obama he always wanted to be captured by the neocons and big capital. Maybe even intended by them to be a mole in Robertson’s chambers. He’s certainly well groomed to be in charge of the USA’s vassal known as the UK.
So much of what Robertson wanted to say about Starmer in mid-2024, but was self-restrained, may be gleaned from reading between the lines of “My hope is that Keir remembers the values he once espoused when he told me it was human rights principles that drew him into politics because he believes them “capable of contributing to the realisation of political change”. If he forgets, there will be no shortage of barristers from Doughty Street to challenge his government’s decisions.”
In one of the comments above, reference is made to a Jane Martinson article in the Guardian yesterday (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/aug/30/press-politicians-debate-refugees-migration-uk,) about the role of the press in promoting anti-migrant feeling. Whilst I agree with most of her article, she suggests that what is dictating the tone of the rightwing media coverage may be to do with newspaper business survival. I disagree. In my view it is primarily about the oligarchs using their power to deflect the blame from who is actually damaging society, namely them, so that they can continue to increase their wealth.
Whether they actually want Farage PM is another matter.
Accepted, and a good correction.
Nigel, of course the oligarchs would be happy with Garage as PM. Why? Look at what Trump is doing. Removing consumer protection regulation, deregulating the banks, sacking federal staff, defunding services and so on.
The Heritage Foundation is at work in the UK peddling their UK + European version of Project 2025.
Section 40 of the Nationality and Borders Act 2022 amended the Immigration Act 1971.
It created a new offence of:
“Knowingly arriving in the United Kingdom without a valid entry clearance or electronic travel authorisation, where required.”
So, yes, those arriving by boat are breaking the law.
But international law – to which we have agreed to comply – makes that nonsense. So please don’t post utter nonsense here.
Richatd,
I’ve been thinking that when we share your pieces on eg. FB your mugshot graphic rather dominates the space. That might not maximize the impact in other forums.
See: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1NxqbsywLv/
Oddly, I thought it was time to redo that today.
Watched this Richard and found it very interesting , the last 5/10 mins i would be interested in your thoughts….
https://youtu.be/bjlqWHXrTak
Jason is essentially right. I will look in more detail later. But the basic truth is that capitalism is killimng is, and itself.
Thank you Richard .