Mahmood’s about-turn on immigration will sink Labour - telegraph.co.uk

With all the speculation about a possible early election, many in the Westminster bubble have been asking whether Andy Burnham is a gambling man.

After his Home Secretary’s conference speech in Liverpool today, we have our answer. Make no mistake, Labour has just rolled the dice on immigration.

Shabana Mahmood signalled that she will soften her migration reforms to be “fair” to legal immigrants who, under her current plans, would have to wait up to a decade longer for indefinite leave to remain (ILR).

Her apparent climbdown came after Labour MPs including Angela Rayner called for care workers to be exempt from her reforms.

And with that, Mahmood’s flagship immigration policy appears to have crumbled. The principle that settlement ought to be earned rather than automatically granted has been at the centre of Labour’s “tough” migration message.

It is Labour’s policy response to Reform’s vow to abolish ILR altogether. The Home Secretary has been bogged down for a year trying to refine the proposal. All apparently for nothing. The core argument upon which the policy is based – that settlement should be based on individual merit, not arbitrary waiting periods or labour market shifts – has imploded.

As her flagship policy collapsed into chaos, the Home Secretary heroically attempted to restore some coherence to her immigration vision, straining to characterise it as the latest bold manifestation of Labour’s historic quest for fairness.

She told the subdued conference hall that just as there is nothing fair about criminal gangs deciding who gets to come to this country, there is nothing fair about the fact that those with genuine need of protection have no safe, legal route to asylum.

In a move that seemed designed to quell criticism that the Home Office drifted too far to the Right on immigration under Keir Starmer, Mahmood unveiled plans to accept applications for “safe and legal” migration routes from next month. This will start with “community” and “student” routes, which will enable local people and universities to sponsor refugees. When Mahmood also announced that Labour will reopen the UK resettlement route in partnership with the United Nations – one quarter of which will be Afghan women and girls fleeing persecution under the Taliban and Palestinians who have fled Gaza – the muted hall suddenly broke out in rapturous applause.

Labour is playing with fire as it pivots to what it thinks is a humanitarian stance. It simply does not have the political capital to soften its approach. Immigration remains the most salient national issue along with the cost of living, according to polling. And Reform UK polls as most trusted on it.

Yes, Labour’s desire to pursue an immigration policy that is compassionate as well as tough is laudable. The vast majority of Britons want a border regime that is robust but also humane.

But it seems highly risky for Labour to make such a bold gesture of global responsibility before it has come up with a compelling deterrence policy to tackle illegal immigration, or even fleshed out a basic philosophic view on immigration.

The danger is that Mahmood’s nuanced approach will be interpreted across the world as a sign that Britain is reverting to a softer migration stance. Opening up new routes won’t prevent some from trying to skip the queue through illegal passage.

The potential to open more legal routes is one of the country’s strongest bargaining chips when it comes to penning a game-changing returns deal with France. Mahmood may have just severely weakened Britain’s negotiating position. Labour MPs point out that with the hotel backlog being cleared, Britain is freeing up capacity to take more refugees. But asylum seekers are moving through the system, rather than vanishing from it, as they are shifted from b&bs into dispersal housing.

It is becoming clear that Labour’s immigration policy is built on sand. This is not only because the party seemingly has neither the inclination nor the resolve to follow it through.

Up until this point, not a single one of the basic pillars that a credible immigration plan requires has been put in place.

Labour still has not formulated a deterrence plan to replace the scrapped Rwanda proposal. Instead it is becoming bogged down with a forever war against Channel traffickers. The breakthrough deal that Britain sorely needs to broker with France – a highly scaled returns or naval interception agreement – remains a distant fantasy. Paris wants an EU-level agreement rather than a bilateral deal, but this simply is not a priority for Brussels.

The only way Britain could realistically get France to the table at this juncture is by agreeing to take a significantly larger number of asylum seekers directly from France, opening up new legal routes. But nobody in Labour appears willing to face up to this.

The asylum crisis has not disappeared, but rather mutated. Outrage over fiscal costs is making way for anxieties over community cohesion.

This is not to mention the fact that Labour lacks a basic philosophy on immigration. What purpose should immigration serve? Who should we accept, who should we reject – and why. Presumably we want top talent, but uncertainty undermines Labour’s intent to expand the Global Talent and High Potential routes. The Government has neither mapped out a proper plan nor allocated serious funding to train the domestic workforce in migrant-dependent sectors like social care.

Nowhere is the party’s penchant for self-immolation clearer than when it comes to immigration.