Gaping holes in Reform's migrant deportation plans

Finances and numbers don't add up in party's calculations

- ALICJA HAGOPIAN, MILLIE COOKE

Nigel Farage has unveiled radical plans for the mass deportation of asylum seekers, including children, to address what he claimed was a “rising anger” among the British public towards the UK’s small boats crisis.

At a press conference in London yesterday, he claimed the party would remove 600,000 asylum seekers under the first parliament of a Reform government, should they win power.

He also pledged to scale up detention capacity for asylum seekers to 24,000 and secure deals with countries such as Afghanistan, Eritrea and Iran to return migrants to their countries.

Reform claims the plan - which would require the UK to leave the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights - will cost £10bn to implement but save £7bn currently spent on illegal migration during the first five years.

The party has said it would also ban anyone who arrives illegally from being able to claim asylum and allow asylum seekers to be detained until deportation.

The plans were condemned by the Refugee Council, which said “toxic narratives” were fuelling fear and division and real public concerns “are being exploited for political gain”, while Labour minister Matthew Pennycook said the plans were like “something put together on the back of a fag packet”.

Lawyers and campaigners have also criticised plans to quit the ECHR, with the proposals being dubbed both “legally extreme” and “a gift to repressive regimes”.

Reform’s latest intervention comes as Labour desperately attempts to get a grip on the migration narrative, as small boat crossings hit record highs, and the UK has seen a string of violent protests in response to the housing of migrants in hotels.

How has Reform calculated its costs?