Farage is telling voters what they want to hear, yet again

Political editor David Maddox has heard this rhetoric before

- David Maddox

As Nigel Farage stood in front of a giant union flag in an aircraft hangar at Oxford airport, the Reform UK leader laid out his solution to one of British voters' biggest concerns – illegal migration and the growing number of asylum seekers arriving in the UK on small boats.

But for those who have been listening to Mr Farage for many years in his now long political career, there was something very familiar about yesterday's announcement. In fact, it was a well-trodden formula for the man who hopes to be Britain's next prime minister.

What Mr Farage offered was, in fact, a repackaging of what could be termed as the “Brexit formula”. In other words, isolate the UK internationally by withdrawing from foundational global agreements, and then expect the rest of the world to simply do what Britain wants.

This sort of solution worked when Lord Palmerston was able to send a gunboat to sit outside a foreign port in the 19th century, but it is quite a lot more complicated now.

The grand plan

Essentially, Farage argues that once he is prime minister, he can force countries like Pakistan, Iran, Syria and Afghanistan to take back thousands of irregular migrants. Those arriving in the UK illegally will be arrested, detained and then deported, the Reform leader said, as he admitted that he cares more about the frustrated British people than the fate of those who will be persecuted.

He will achieve his goal by withdrawing from the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), making the UK an outlier along with Russia and Belarus. He will also suspend other international agreements, like the Refugee Convention, for five years.