Sunak’s decision to call early election was one of the ‘most stupid political misjudgements’ in the history of politics, former Tory party chair says
The former Tory chairman Jake Berry has said he believes the Conservative government’s plan on illegal immigration was “working” but that Labour has undermined its progress by reversing large parts of it. “Particularly the idea that people who went to our country illegally cannot claim asylum,” Berry, who represented the Rossendale and Darwen constituency, said. His comments came after Home Office stats – which painted a mixed picture – revealed that small boat crossings had fallen by 29%, while enforced returns are up by 48%.
The UK’s asylum backlog crept upwards in 2024, however, despite pledges by the last government to drive numbers down. The data also showed Keir Starmer has inherited a fall in net migration after changes introduced by Sunak’s government.
Speaking to Times Radio, Berry continued:
I think the third thing it proves to me is the fact the absolute idiocy of Rishi Sunak calling that early election.
Everyone tells me what a clever man he is. I think he must have taken leave of his senses that day if he ever had them in the first place because we have had an interest rate cut, the economy is growing and immigration is coming down.
It will just will go down in history as one of the most stupid political misjudgements, political judgments, in the history of politics.
Labour is set to continue with some Conservative policies on legal immigration, including the restrictions on who is eligible for dependent visas.
Key events
Jessica Murray
Jessica Murray is the Guardian’s Midlands correspondent, based in Birmingham
Politicians in Birmingham have called for council cuts, thought to be the biggest in local authority history, to be halted or scaled back over concerns the council’s financial crisis may have been overstated.
Birmingham city council is planning to make £300m in savings and sell assets worth £750m before April 2026 after it issued a section 114 notice, in effec declaring bankruptcy, in September last year.
There are concerns, however, that the council does not have a clear picture of its financial situation, and that proposed cuts are based on potentially inaccurate data.
This week a report from the Audit Reform Lab, at the University of Sheffield, commissioned by the Unite, Unison and GMB trade unions, said “cuts and asset sales were progressed in a context of uncertainty around the quality of financial information used to justify these interventions”.
It concluded the council’s financial problems were attributed to a “prematurely disclosed and potentially overstated” equal pay claim liability of £760m that “remains speculative and unaudited”.
The report found cuts had been pushed through with “little public consultation” under “statutory direction”, and would probably lead to “cost spirals and worsening outcomes for the city”.
As we reported in an earlier post (see post at 10.41), the new Home Office statistics showed that health and care worker visas granted to main applicants in the 12 months to June fell by more than a quarter (26%) on the previous year, to 89,095.
There was a steep drop of 81% for the period April to June alone – coinciding with the Conservative government’s ban on foreign care workers bringing loved ones to the UK on their visas.
Mike Padgham, chairman of the Independent Care Group representing adult social care providers in York and North Yorkshire, said:
A fall in the number of overseas staff is the last thing social care needs at the moment, as we are struggling to fill shifts as it is.
The last government’s brutal measures are working and the lifeline of overseas staff to help staff homecare and care and nursing homes has been cut.
He said “serious measures” must be put in place to replace the overseas workers no longer coming to the UK, adding: “We desperately need to see the new government’s promised care workforce strategy and with it some funding measures that will help us to properly reward care workers and enable us to recruit at home, otherwise we will be in dire straits.”
Migrant charity the Work Rights Centre called for the new Labour government to scrap the ban on dependents, saying it isolates workers from their families.
The Home Office said the fall in care worker visa applications and grants towards the end of 2023 “is likely due to more scrutiny applied by the Home Office to employers in the health and social care sector, and compliance activity taken against employers of migrant workers”.
A 20-month prison sentence handed to a 77-year-old woman for a climate protest on the M25 is disproportionate, unjust and a waste of resources, the Green MP Carla Denyer has said.
In a letter to Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, Denyer called the jailing of Gaie Delap three weeks ago “an example of an ongoing and serious problem with disproportionate sentencing for climate activists”.
Delap, from Bristol, was sent to prison three weeks ago for her part in a campaign of disruptive protests on the M25 in November 2022.
Denyer, recently elected as the MP for Bristol Central, said she had “deep concern” over the “disproportionate sentence” given to her constituent, whose actions were “entirely peaceful and nonviolent and designed to draw attention to the threat posed by the climate emergency”.
Pointing out that Delap’s protest was intended to force the government’s hand into a ban on new fossil fuel exploration in the North Sea, Denyer added: “As you will be aware, your government has rightly opted not to issue new licences, meaning that Gaie and her fellow protesters have been jailed for advocating for a position aligning with Labour’s own plans.
“So whilst I am encouraged that your government has taken this step towards protecting the environment, Gaie’s disproportionate sentencing neither constitutes justice nor is necessary as a means of discouraging participation in further action to stop new oil and gas extraction.”
You can read the full story by the Guardian’s environment correspondent, Damien Gayle, here:
Previous government left asylum system in ‘meltdown’, campaigners say
Home Office figures showed 118,882 people were waiting for an initial decision on asylum applications in the UK at the end of June, up slightly from the 118,329 waiting at the end of March. The Guardian’s home affairs editor, Rajeev Syal, has crunched the latest Home Office numbers on asylum in this story.
In reaction to the figures, released this morning, Imran Hussain, from the Refugee Council, said the last government “left an asylum system in meltdown as a result of the Rwanda plan and the Illegal Migration Act, which effectively banned asylum in the UK”.
The “chaos” meant the “productivity of Home Office decision makers in the months before the election was at its lowest since the height of the Covid pandemic”, he said, warning it will “take time to move the system from a state of crisis to being fit for purpose”.
New Home Office migration stats out today – a few striking things.
First, asylum backlog has basically stayed flat over last few months as HO decision making has fallen.
This is because post 7 March 2023 cases were paused due to Illegal Migration Act and Rwanda plan pic.twitter.com/uYnxj3rU1r
— Marley Morris (@MarleyAMorris) August 22, 2024
Marley Morris, from thinktank the Institute for Public Policy Research, said the figures show the backlog had “barely changed” in the last few months while ministers were “distracted” by efforts to send migrants to Rwanda in a bid to deter Channel crossings, while academics said asylum processing had stagnated.
Meanwhile, Peter Walsh, senior researcher at the University of Oxford’s Migration Observatory, said:
Until earlier this year, the government was still working through applications that weren’t affected by the Illegal Migration Act, which meant it was able to progressively reduce the backlog.
However, it seems that the new legislation started to bite in the spring, when the Home Office ran out of older cases to process. In theory, the previous government did have some discretion to continue to process claims (as Labour says it is now doing) but it appears to have decided not to use it.
Sunak’s decision to call early election was one of the ‘most stupid political misjudgements’ in the history of politics, former Tory party chair says
The former Tory chairman Jake Berry has said he believes the Conservative government’s plan on illegal immigration was “working” but that Labour has undermined its progress by reversing large parts of it. “Particularly the idea that people who went to our country illegally cannot claim asylum,” Berry, who represented the Rossendale and Darwen constituency, said. His comments came after Home Office stats – which painted a mixed picture – revealed that small boat crossings had fallen by 29%, while enforced returns are up by 48%.
The UK’s asylum backlog crept upwards in 2024, however, despite pledges by the last government to drive numbers down. The data also showed Keir Starmer has inherited a fall in net migration after changes introduced by Sunak’s government.
Speaking to Times Radio, Berry continued:
I think the third thing it proves to me is the fact the absolute idiocy of Rishi Sunak calling that early election.
Everyone tells me what a clever man he is. I think he must have taken leave of his senses that day if he ever had them in the first place because we have had an interest rate cut, the economy is growing and immigration is coming down.
It will just will go down in history as one of the most stupid political misjudgements, political judgments, in the history of politics.
Labour is set to continue with some Conservative policies on legal immigration, including the restrictions on who is eligible for dependent visas.
UK ministers rule out joining youth mobility scheme with EU
Ministers have reiterated their opposition to any deal with Brussels allowing young people to live and work in EU countries, after a report said some elements of this could be agreed as part of a wider set of negotiations.
The Times on Wednesday cited unnamed government sources as saying UK ministers accepted they would have to “give ground” over parts of a proposed mutual youth mobility system if they were to get agreement in other areas, such as a reduction in checks on UK food entering the EU.
“If we are serious about resetting relations with the EU then we need to be prepared to give them some of the things that they want,” the source told the paper.
But a government spokesperson said this was not being looked at. “We are not considering it, there are no plans for this, or any work being done on it,” they said.
Asked whether the issue might come up in future talks with the EU, they said: “Our negotiating team has very clear red lines, and none of the preparatory work involves this.”
While Labour has been adamant it will never oversee a return to the free movement of people, the idea of a youth mobility scheme – which would allow EU citizens under 30 to work and study for a fixed period in the UK, and vice-versa – would be more similar to deals the UK has with countries such as Australia.
You can read the full story by my colleagues, Peter Walker and Lisa O’Carroll, here:
Emily Dugan
Emily Dugan is a senior reporter for the Guardian
Sadiq Khan will ask senior leaders in the Metropolitan police to consider expediting investigations into collisions where children have died after meeting the parents of the two girls killed in the Wimbledon school crash.
The mayor of London’s met the families of Nuria Sajjad and Selena Lau, two eight-year-olds who died last year after a Land Rover ploughed into the Study prep school in Wimbledon, south-west London.
Nuria’s parents and Selena’s father met Khan at City Hall on Wednesday, along with their lawyer.
The families raised concerns about the pace of the police investigation, which took almost a year to decide that no charges would be brought against the driver after finding she had an epileptic seizure while at the wheel.
Nuria’s parents spoke to the Guardian in April this year about the devastating impact that the long wait for answers had on them. The Met announced last month it would review its handling of the investigation.
On Wednesday, Khan was pressed on concerns about the handling of the case by Trevor Sterling, a lawyer representing 20 of the families affected by the incident, as well as the parents of Nuria and Selena.
SNP membership drops by 12% in less than a year
Membership of the Scottish National Party has dropped by 12% in less than a year, party accounts show.
The PA news agency reports that accounts filed with the Electoral Commission show that as of June 1 this year, SNP membership stood at 64,525.
That was down 9,411 from the membership the party had – as revealed in the previous year’s accounts – of 73,936 on June 29, 2023.
That compares to 103,884 members the SNP had at the end of December 2021 – with the latest accounts stating: “Our membership has fallen from recent historic highs.”
Income from membership fees has also fallen, with the total raised dropping from £2,286,944 in 2022 to £2,093,967 in 2023.
With the accounts noting the impact of “cost-of-living pressures” on both donations and fundraising income, the party states it is offering members the option of a “holiday” from fees or reduced giving in a bid to help keep numbers up.
“At all levels we need to redouble our efforts to recruit new members,” the accounts state.
Despite the reduction in membership fees, SNP income overall grew last year – going from £4,248,625 in 2022 to £4,753,512 in 2023.
After posting a deficit of just over £800,000 in 2022 the party has returned to surplus, with the figures showing this to be £662,293.
That comes after spending by the party fell markedly from £5,052,284 in 2022 to £4,091,219 in 2023.
However the party’s income for 2023 included £274,408 of cash left in legacies by supporters after their death – with the accounts stating this money “has not actually yet been received”.
Scottish Tory leadership hopeful admits he made a ‘bad call’ when backing Liz Truss to be PM
Scottish Conservative leadership candidate Russell Findlay said he made “a bad call” when he backed Liz Truss to be prime minister.
The former crime journalist turned politician endorsed Truss, who lasted 45 days in office, in August 2022 as she fought to be UK Tory leader.
Her disastrous mini-budget in September 2022, with its planned £45bn of unfunded tax cuts, was followed by near panic on the bond markets, a slump in the pound and higher mortgage rates.
Asked about his decision to endorse the former prime minister, Findlay, the Scottish Tory justice spokesperson, said:
We all get things wrong. I got that wrong. Our number one job as Conservatives is to look after the country’s finances, to be responsible, and she didn’t do that …
I don’t think it is reasonable to think I could have foreseen how events transpired.
As we reported earlier (see post at 11.29), two MSPs – Jamie Greene and Liam Kerr – ended their campaigns and will now back Murdo Fraser to replace Douglas Ross as leader of the Scottish Conservatives.
It leaves three MSPs in contention for the top job – Russell Findlay, Murdo Fraser and former deputy leader Meghan Gallacher. The winner will be announced on 27 September 2024.
The number of people resettled in the UK under legal routes set up in the wake of the Taliban takeover has risen year on year but people from Afghanistan were also the most common nationality making the dangerous Channel crossing in the 12 months to June.
The PA news agency has this analysis of the Home Office figures:
Afghans accounted for almost a fifth (18%) of what the Home Office refers to as small boat arrivals for that period.
Some 5,370 Afghans arrived by this route in the 12 months to June, although the government said this number was down by 41% on the previous year.
Combined with other routes such as what the Home Office refers to as inadequately documented air arrivals or port arrivals, a total of 6,009 Afghans were detected arriving by so-called irregular means.
Meanwhile, 7,708 people were resettled in the UK in the year to June under the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme (ACRS) and Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy (Arap) – set up as the Taliban returned to power in 2021.
A total of 2,336 people came to the UK in the year to June under the ACRS, which is split into three pathways.
Steve Valdez-Symonds, Amnesty International UK’s refugee and migrant rights director, has reacted to the latest Home Office data, saying that most people seeking safety in the UK are assessed to be entitled to asylum, adding that the government needs to provide safe alternative routes to the UK for people to claim asylum (My colleague, Jamie Grierson, has this useful explainer on safe and legal asylum alternatives to cut Channel crossings).
Valdez-Symonds said:
Today’s statistics again show that relatively few people come to the UK seeking safety from war and persecution, and – save for people from Ukraine – nearly everyone seeking asylum must rely on unsafe journeys and people-smugglers because the Government won’t provide safe alternatives.
The statistics show that most people seeking safety in the UK are judged to be entitled to asylum if and when their claims are properly decided, but the system’s still suffering the chronic impact of the previous Government’s disastrous refusal to process claims.
What the raw statistics can’t show is the true circumstances and humanity of each and every person involved.
Sadly, yesterday’s immigration announcement suggests the new Government intends to follow its predecessor by leaning into a heavily ‘securitised’ approach that ignores the vulnerability of people forced to make highly unsafe journeys while shirking its responsibility to establish systems which treat people fairly and with basic humanity.
