Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced "the most sweeping asylum reforms in modern times" on Monday. She used her own immigrant background to claim she was perfectly justified - indeed, on a "moral mission" to "fix the broken system and unite the divided country"...
And surprise, surprise, she got the thumbs up from Tory leader Kemi Badenoch and from Danny Kruger, the ex-Tory who went over to Reform! Kruger said he was looking forward to accepting her application to Farage's party. Apparently Tommy Robinson also approved.
After she'd talked about a society torn apart by the refugee crisis she was criticised for making division in society worse by her language, so she feigned anger at her critic, saying, "I am the one who's called a f***ing Paki". This produced the effect she'd hoped for: a reprimand from the Speaker of the House and expressions of sympathy from several members of the opposition for her "very shocking" experience...
It won't stop the boats and they know it
The policy which the Home Secretary unveiled is a bit more shocking. Its most striking aspect is the 20 years that asylum seekers would have to wait before applying for British citizenship - as opposed to the current 5 years. Just a few months ago the idea was to copy the Tories' 10-year proposal...
This 20-year rule is meant to be the main migration deterrent - it's Mahmood's version of the Tories' Rwanda scheme. There'd be no automatic financial support for refugees and their temporary status would be reviewed every 30 months. The right to appeal against deportation would be reduced to one application. And deportations of all non-genuine refugees would be prompt.
Does the government think that this will stop the boats and prevent refugees from paying smugglers lots of money? Of course it doesn't. It knows that the only way to stop the boats is to provide a safe alternative way for would-be migrants to come to Britain. More people died last year trying to cross the Channel in precarious dinghies - 74! - than in all previous years put together. This, above all, is why Mahmood's policy is inhuman and, frankly, racist.
The politicians of every party echo Mahmood: they all say that borders need to be controlled. But while they admit the world has changed, they don't think borders need "changing" Mahmood agreed with Labour backbenchers that "safe and legal routes" must be created, but only conceded that a few - maybe 100 - refugees would initially be allowed in this way. And only after "we restore order and control".
It's quite remarkable that the one factual pro-migration argument is absent from the debate: that the "British" population is in serious decline. The chronic shortage of nurses, skilled trades, teachers, etc., has a biological reason: a fall in the birth rate - a crisis in most rich countries, which means that immigration is vital! Refugees are a natural solution to a problem plaguing all the "old" former colonial powers, in fact!
The new far right in Downing Street
For now, however, it seems Mahmood's announcement has had the effect she wanted: appealing to potential Reform voters in the hope they'll vote Labour. She's responded directly to the small demonstrations organised by overt racists - Britain First, UKIP, Patriotic Alternative, Homeland etc., activists who deliberately conflate asylum-seeking and sexual/"criminal" offences as happened in the obviously contrived episode in Epping. Starmer has even defended the flag-planting epidemic - which is quite evidently aimed against "foreigners".
But forget about the government exposing racism and xenophobia for what they are, or opposing them! If there's a divisive threat today, it's emanating directly from Labour's Starmer and his ministers, in fact!
Isn't it a Labour council in Birmingham which has been holding out against the bin-workers' strike? Yes, a strike that's just been reinforced by the same agency temps who this anti-working class council had expected to scab against the strikers!
And what about Health Secretary Wes Streeting's outburst against the doctors' strike? He portrays them as greedy villains when in fact they're fighting against utter exhaustion and overwork - and being stuck in posts paying even lower wages, because the NHS chooses not to create the necessary vacancies for them to complete specialist training.
Streeting deliberately played the divisive card when he claimed that "struggling working families" would be looking at the doctors, thinking how well they're paid and wondering "how dare they strike" when NHS waiting lists are so long! When quite obviously, it's the government which is 100% to blame for the poor state of the NHS and for doctors' appalling working conditions/low pay (half of a train driver's, 25% less than a Ford car worker's)!
So yes, who needs the far-right when you have Shabana Mahmood, Wes Streeting and Keir Starmer doing the "divide and rule" job for the capitalist class - using all tools in the box, to attack our class and the most vital part of it today: our brothers and sisters from overseas!