I feel absolutely sick to my stomach this morning.
I really need to get out of the habit of thinking that Labour Ministers will somehow have more sense, or that their values will align more closely with mine even if they get stuff wrong sometimes. That mindset only leads to crushing disappointment.
We have had decades of the right wing press drip-feeding prejudice against immigrants. All political parties, including ours to a certain extent, have failed to stand up against this and unashamedly make the positive case for immigration. This has been remarkably stupid given that we are living in a world that has been getting smaller. People fall in love with people from other countries. If every country pulls up the drawbridge on immigration, that has a huge impact on their freedom to live their lives as they please.
It’s been incredibly depressing to see, particularly over the last decade, politicians in parties who should know better taking on board the talking points of the far right. Rather than, you know, invest in public services so that everyone can have a decent standard of living, they blame immigration for all the country’s ills, poisoning the minds of the public.
We reached a new low this morning. I’ve heard Labour referred to as the Red Tories before. Today they are basically Red Reform. Starmer is no better than Farage. A couple of weeks ago, Farage had a go, out loud in our Parliament, about “cultures alien to ours.” This was a comment that Christine Jardine said made her blood run cold in her Scotsman column last week.
This week I heard the leader of Reform proclaim confidently in the Commons that the problem with immigration was that it was bringing people here with cultures not compatible with our own. I felt my blood run cold.
That sort of language used to be, and should be still, unthinkable. We cannot accept it, we cannot run from fighting for the rights of minorities. It’s time for us to stand up to be counted. Like our grandparents did.
Why does it take an opposition MP to make this point? Why did our Prime Minister not make mincemeat of Farage and his horrible agenda right there, right then?
It’s the least we could expect.
But, no, this morning, he apes it, saying we are:
an island of strangers, not a nation that walks forward together.
There are not enough vomit emojis in the world to deal with that one.
Starmer said he wasn’t pandering to any other political party and this was coming from his beliefs. If that is the case, he needs to find some better values.
Every racist in our country now thinks they have the Prime Minister on their side.
So let’s look at what he’s planning to do:
Social care
Our social care sector is currently on its knees. It depends on people coming from abroad. Last July the Social Care Benchmarking Report revealed huge difficulties in recruitment:
The report reveals that, across 2022-23, 95% of organisations found it either ‘very difficult’ or ‘quite difficult’ to recruit frontline staff.
The top three reasons for recruitment difficulties were ‘pay levels’, ‘too few applications’ and ‘local competitors’ such as retail.
So it looks like we just don’t have the workers here to do what is a vocation rather than a job. What would you prefer? You or your Granny to be looked after by someone who has an aptitude for care, or someone who has been forced into a role that doesn’t suit them on pain of Universal Credit sanctions.
And while we’re there, Starmer beat another drum of prejudice in his speech, that trope of how there are all these disabled people on benefits who need to get out to work.
What worries me is that people will be denied disability benefits and find themselves forced into providing care that they may actually need themselves.
We do need to treat carers better, pay them more and give them career progression, but we also need to accept that we may not be able to meet our own needs, especially with an aging population.
My WhatsApp chats lit up with people condemning the targeting of foreign care workers. One told me:
The last agency we had, all the carers were from African countries and they were the best carers we ever had over 10 years of care. They treated Mum like she was their own Mum and gave her so much respect. They would do literally anything she asked. If anything, I would be the one stopping them doing tasks that weren’t part of their job.
International students
According to a Universities UK Report in 2023, international students bring in a massive £41.9 billion to the UK economy. They help universities balance the books too.
If you make their lives more difficult and don’t offer them post-graduate opportunities, then they are more than likely to go somewhere else.
Cutting net migration
Cutting migration for the sake of it harms us. We should be looking at the benefits people from other countries bring in terms of skills rather than looking at them as a drain on resources. We should appreciate them for the work they do in our public services and across our whole economy and we should be honest enough to say that we need them.
A positive, liberal alternative
So what should we do? We should ride a coach and horses through Labour’s plans and we should be bold. We should not give a damn about what the Daily Mail says or thinks.
We should shout about the benefits of being an open, liberal, generous-spirited country and we should not put up with yet another Government failing to meet the needs of our communities by investing enough in public services and housing and then using people who choose this country to live as scapegoats for their failure. We need big picture emotional language that reflects our values as Liberal Democrats. It’s time to challenge the language of prejudice with good, solid practical ideas that will improve the quality of our lives.
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
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19 Comments
Thank you for this. Starmer’s recent comments would seem to contradict not only the UK’s treaty commitments but also the Equality Act. Everyone in need should be guaranteed their right to asylum, regardless of whether or not they’re capable of working. And we desperately need more trained care workers. Inadequate care often means immediate pain and suffering; it increases hospitalisations, placing unnecessary strain on the NHS; and it interferes with many disabled people’s ability to work, which also has a detrimental economic effect. We all flourish if we invest in people.
Well said Caron!
Aa the husband, son, & great-grandchild of immigrants over hundreds of year, the contribution of immigrants to Britsh society has been immense.
It is ahicking to hear a Labour PM to repeat the racist, anti-immigrant messages that were said in the 1880’s against the Irish, in the 1890’s against Jews, in 1920s against Eastern Europeans, in thec1950’s against West Indians and in the 1960’s against South Asians.
We must stand up against this prejudice and fr the British values of openess, tolerance and welcoming of those who come to enrich our country.
‘What would you prefer? You or your Granny to be looked after by someone who has an aptitude for care, or someone who has been forced into a role that doesn’t suit them on pain of Universal Credit sanctions.’
You’ve hit the nail on the head there. Already we see that the time of care home managers is being wasted by applications from unsuitable applicants who have been ‘encouraged’ to apply by the JobCentre. And the idea that square pegs can be forced into round holes, especially in the care sector, is ludicrous; for a start PVG clearance is required as well as proper training.
I agree with Caron, though a comment and a bit of clarity from Sir Ed would be welcome :
“Sky News, 19 June 2024, “Sir Ed Davey has said legal migration is “too high”.
I don’t often cite the IEA, but one of its brighter sparks recently suggested that liberals of different shades (including classical/economic types who usually vote conservative) may need to start becoming better friends to combat the authoritarianism coming out of both the social democratic left and tory-reform right. Keir Starmer is an absolute moral coward and the Labour Party, if they have any soul whatsoever, should depose him. This, certain lefty friends (and D Finkelstein), is – for the last time – why liberals don’t just join the Labour Party; it has all the liberalism of a blow to the head.
#tabloidlabour
Totally agree with Caron’s piece but disappointed in our party’s response so far (from Lisa Smart) which makes no condemnation of Starmer’s tone and states that Starmer’s “plan” needs to be coupled with measure to recruit more British workers. The CBI’s response was more Liberal than ours! What are we afraid of?
I think this is the point where i give up on Starmer. Like Groucho, if you dont like his principles, he has others. And pretty grubby they are too.
The series Families Like Ours on BBC is well timed, bringing together the topics of refugees and climate change. When its Europeans from a sophisticated country that become refugees and migrants when their country is no longer habitable. How would we all respond?
Well said. Lifelong Labour voter & former member here, have been desperately trying to keep the faith with them but, after this abject pandering to Reform, I’m done. I’d like to hear Ed Davey’s stance on this but I think the Lib Dems will be getting my vote in future.
Caron, thank you for this article. Keir Starmer’s remarks were disgusting.
What you say in this article, is what Ed Davey and other Lib Dem parliamentarians should be saying. If a liberal party does not speak out about the benefits of immigration, and condemn anti-immigration rhetoric, then who will?
When I was young(ish) I used to say that I fought the Tories and argued with Labour. I don’t think I’ve said it for the last forty years. The kindest thing I can say about Starmer’s utterances this morning is that this horror show is probably inevitable when political inexperience joins forces with Morgan McSweeney and Pat McFadden
Is there a common thread to why Reform and the government are scapegoating minorities (eg trans people), immigrants, casting doubt on abortion rights? Any echoes of the Trump regime?
What you say is right of course Caron, only perhaps there’s a subtext that all migrants are the same (which is also a subtext of Reform et al, though they will highlight a few criminals and “scroungers”) and of course migrants are not all the same, everybody is their own unique person, and every ethnicity etc, has their own cultural, political, etc distinctiveness.
So it should be possible to reframe this debate in slightly more relevant terms: what is the quantity and quality of immigration that we want, and how might we go about getting it. In this context clearly skills are important, as is a willingness to do jobs that we find hard to fill. And more broadly relevant is whether somebody will make a positive contribution to British society, culture and life, or a negative one. Policy is too blunt a tool ever to achieve a perfect selection but we might ask if the policy we have is working as well as it might.
And I appreciate that there may be a lot of debate over what counts as a positive contribution. I think diversity is a positive but others might not. Support for values of tolerance, freedom, democracy, civil rights and so on is pretty important and can’t be taken for granted these days.
We should also recognise historic obligations and connections such as to Ukraine, Hong Kong, Israel/Palestine, and the Commonwealth.
Ed Davey has (rightly) been focusing on the need to improve social care. I just hope he will therefore condemn Keir Starmer’s plan to stop care homes from recruiting from overseas. There is already a desparate shortage of staff in the care sector. Very few British workers are applying for vacancies in social care, which is why employers need to recruit from overseas. Keir Starmer evidently does not care about the impact of this policy on vulnerable care home residents. I hope Lib Dems will have the courage to speak about how, as a country, we *need* immigration
Well said Caron. And by validating rather than challenging Reform’s world view, the most likely outcome is Labour INCREASING their vote. As many have said, over and over again, no other party can out-Reform Reform. The more voters you persuade that Reform are correct, the more voters will vote for the real thing.
@Geoff Reid, according to what I’ve read this Morgan McSweeney chap whoever he is , is pulling all the strings in this weird Labour Party.
Thanks Caron – that last paragrapph is powerful and shows how the Lib Dems can lead those who support openness and tolerance. We need to have clear rules on immigration but they should be promoted in a sensitive way and without the rhetoric of Enoch Powell being deployed in what looks like a panicked reaction to the local election results. I feel very sad for all of the people I know in the UK whose parents or grandparents came from other countries or who are seeking sanctuary, like our Ukrainian friends. They will feel a little less welcome since yesterday and we have to show that millions do support them.
I fully agree with the above comments and can really think of nothing to add. All I can say is that Sir Keir Starmer is looking ahead to the next Elections; I think he sees a threat from Reform to the Labour Party and, just like Boris Johnson before him, will say what he thinks the electorate want to hear. I don’t think his personal beliefs enter into it; he just wants to win the next Elections.
A great article, Caron. Yes, people fall in love with people from other countries and all three of my children did. Our family is the richer for that.
If you think you live in a ‘land of strangers’ maybe you should talk to people more and in a more welcoming way.
It always puzzles me when people say ‘They should integrate and learn English ‘ So, are we going to do away with racial prejudice in job recruitment and provide more ESOL teachers, paid for by taxpayers? That would be good.
Politicians saying migrants are denying citizens of work is as lame as saying a prince is being made to walk the streets om foot while the servants ride on horses.