Women and children would be deported under Reform UK’s plans to remove 600,000 illegal migrants within five years, Nigel Farage has said.
Emergency powers would be passed to stop all small boat arrivals within days of a Reform-led government coming to power, he said, and there would be a “carrot and stick approach” to encourage people to leave, followed by forcible detentions and removals.
Farage raised the prospect that children born in the UK to parents who arrived illegally could also be deported, but added such a move would be “complex”.
At Oxford London airport on Tuesday, Farage gave details of how Reform would tackle illegal migration if it won the next election, a campaign he called “Operation Restoring Justice”.
He said “phase one” would focus on removing men and women. Unaccompanied children would be sent back “towards the latter half of that five years”.
Farage said up to 600,000 illegal migrants would be deported over the course of the next parliament, although Zia Yusuf, a senior Reform figure who helped to draw up the plans, suggested the figure could be as high as 650,000. That would involve at least a ten-fold increase from the present number of deportations, which stood at 9,072 in the year to June, the Home Office said last week.
Farage acknowledged some limited exceptions, saying that “brave” Afghan interpreters who had helped British forces fighting against the Taliban would be allowed to remain, even if they had come by illegal routes.
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He admitted it was “not easy” to decide how far back those living in the UK illegally would be traced. Asked whether children born in the UK to those who arrived irregularly could be sent to a country they had never lived in, Farage said: “How far back you go with this is the difficulty, and I accept that.”
He added: “I’m not standing here telling you all of this is easy, all of this is straightforward. And we had of course with the Windrush row, we had a situation there where people who had come 50, 60, in fact nearly 70 years ago, had faulty paperwork. So there is an exercise of common sense that has to come in here.”
The prospect of enforcement raids similar to those by the US’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement was also suggested by Farage. “Will Border Force be seeking out people who are here illegally, possibly many of them working in the criminal economy? Yes, it’s what normal countries do all over the world.”
Farage could not name any RAF bases where detainees would be held, or where deportation flights could depart from, when pressed on how viable the plans were.
Reform has said that RAF Voyager, a government-owned plane, would be put on standby in case of problems with the five daily chartered flights it has promised.
However, there are only a handful of suitable RAF bases either not in full military use or that could be repurposed without costing significant sums.
Asked whether RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire could be used, Farage said the public’s main concern was avoiding having illegal immigrants on the street. He had criticised the previous Tory government for planning to turn the base into a migrant detention centre.
Migrants leaving France for Britain on Monday
HANNAH MCKAY/REUTERS
Reform’s deportation scheme would involve the erection of pre-fabricated buildings with food and medical help supplied. Those held there would not be allowed to leave.
In total, Reform put the cost of its policy at £10 billion over five years, arguing that it would result in a net saving of £7 billion during the next parliament.
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To avoid legal challenges, Reform promised to introduce legislation to temporarily disapply international human rights law and replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights.
The UK would leave the European Convention on Human Rights.
Farage suggested he was open to striking deals with the Taliban or Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to deport Afghans and Iranians — even if they would face torture or persecution on their return.
Asked whether he would be happy paying the Taliban or Iran to take back illegal migrants, Farage did not respond directly, but said no illegal migrants from Iran should be able to walk the streets of Britain.
The deportation announcement marked the end of Reform’s summer-long campaign, which claimed “Britain is lawless”. It was also an attempt by the party, which is leading opinion polls, to move from criticism of the government to proposing policy, which will be scrutinised.
Ministers have said they will appeal against a High Court ruling ordering the Bell Hotel in Epping Forest to stop housing migrants, but aim to stop using asylum hotels by the end of this parliament.
The Bell in Essex, where protesters have gathered to condemn its use as an asylum hotel
IAN DAVIDSON/ALAMY
Somani Hotels, the owner of the Bell, will have its attempt to challenge the High Court decision heard at the Court of Appeal on Thursday.
After protests were held outside other hotels over the bank holiday weekend, Farage said anger about migrants posed “a genuine threat to public order”. He added that people had “just had enough” after an “invasion” of small boat arrivals.