Tories Suddenly Tough on Immigration?

(Photograph: David Woolfall, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

Immigration (particularly the illegal variety) is unquestionably the fundamental issue facing the West at this point in political history. Whatever side of the fence you sit on, you know that tough talk promising a crackdown on illegals, or compassionate noises about human rights is what translates into votes come election time. During a recent address to the American Enterprise Institute, a centre-right think tank in Washington DC, UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman certainly set out her stall early:

Just as it is a basic rule of history that nations which cannot defend their borders will not long survive, it is a basic rule of politics that political systems which cannot control their borders will not maintain the consent of the people and thus not long endure.

In other words, ‘we’d better get a grip on immigration, or we might be forced out of business’. In some walks of life, thirteen years into your administration would be considered ‘late to the party,’ but still it’s nice to see the Tories get there in the end.

So far, so good then. And having heard Braverman’s speech roundly condemned for its “deeply divisive,” “cynicism and xenophobia,” which risked “further legitimising hate and violence against LBGT+ people” from political heavyweights such as the United Nations and Elton John, I confess my curiosity was piqued. You, of course, must decide whether Braverman lived up to the hype.

During the 30-minute speech, Braverman took us through the alarming statistics on illegal immigration:

• “A 2021 Gallup poll found that 16% of adults worldwide (around 900 million people) would like permanently to leave their own country.”
• “40 million named Britain as their preferred destination.”
• “In 2022, a total of 330,000 illegal border crossings into the EU were detected, an increase of 66% on the previous year.”
• “In the UK, roughly 70% of those arriving illegally on small boats are men aged under 40.”
• “There has been more migration to the UK and Europe in the last 25 years, than in all the time that went before.”
• When the UN Refugee Convention was signed, it conferred protection on some 2 million people in Europe. According to analysis by Nick Timothy and Carl Williams for the Centre for Policy Studies, it now confers the notional right to move to another country upon at least 780 million people.”

The Home Secretary then laid out her four main arguments against mass immigration. They revolved around concerns for civics, practicality, security, and democracy, before moving on to the rhetoric which has predictably been labelled controversial:

• “Uncontrolled immigration, inadequate integration, and a misguided dogma of multiculturalism have proven a toxic combination for Europe in the last few decades.”
• “Multiculturalism makes no demands of the incomer to integrate. It has failed because it allowed people to come to our society and live parallel lives in it.”
• “We will not be able to sustain an asylum system if in effect, simply being gay, or a woman, and fearful of discrimination in your country of origin, is sufficient to qualify for protection.”
• “I’m afraid we do see many instances where people purport to be gay when they’re not actually gay, but in order to get special treatment.”

Of course, unless you are a Westminster politician, there is nothing remotely controversial contained within the Braverman speech; visit any British pub outside Kensington, and you’ll hear much the same opinions voiced. Not only that, it’s all been said before by the very European leaders who signed us up to the project. Indeed, the architects of multiculturalism have admitted its failure, as Angela Merkel did way back in 2010, parroted by Sarkosy and Cameron the following year. Closer to home, every Conservative prime minister and home secretary for the past 13 years has promised an end to the scourge of illegal immigration; not one has made a noticeable dent in it.

While not quite channelling her inner Enoch Powell, 20 minutes in, Braverman had done a good job of rousing her audience to expect an impressive denouement. What then would her solution be to this existential challenge? Radical action perhaps? Alas, no—instead, we got the inevitable anti-climax.

Having acknowledged both the success of Australia’s hands-on approach to stopping the boats the old-fashioned way, and the scant possibility of reforming the 1951 UN Refugee Convention, Braverman bizarrely seemed to conclude that the path to tread was much the same primrose one the Tories have been leading us down the past few years, which she classified as “unilateral or bilateral solutions and policies of deterrence.” In other words, the Conservative Party’s plan is to pray the Rwanda deal will be given the green light by the Supreme Court (absolutely not a given), and to continue bribing the French to condescend to do their job.

While much of the rhetoric was encouraging, Braverman made many troubling assertions throughout her speech which makes one continue to question whether the Conservative Party really has the stomach for the fight to secure the borders. “It is 13 years since Merkel gave her speech, and I’m not sure that much has changed since” said Braverman, seemingly unaware of the irony. “There is an optimal level of immigration—it is not zero.” Why on earth not?! What could possibly be objectionable about a strong, cohesive society which requires nothing from the outside world that it cannot already provide for itself? And the frankly naïve, “There is a strong argument that (those who cross from France to Britain via the Channel, and who have passed through or lived in those countries for a number of years) should cease to be treated as refugees.” If only someone else had thought of that!

Despite the support of right-wing luminaries like Douglas Murray, I’m afraid I’m not convinced by the overall consistency of Braverman’s speech. I like Braverman and would love to be wrong about this, but there are three points which I cannot ignore: first of all, commending the success of Tony Abbott’s administration but failing to draw inspiration from his policies threatens credibility and lacks gumption. Second, assuming Braverman genuinely believes we are at crisis point, underlining the flaws in both the ECHR and the UN Refugee Convention, but failing to commit to the possibility of leaving either is not good enough. Even Theresa May called for the UK to depart the ECHR, while Michael Howard’s team proposed leaving the Refugee Convention. Third, and perhaps most important, with the next general election likely less than a year away, it’s hard to see Braverman’s address as much more than a leadership challenge to an already beleaguered Sunak.

At the very end of her speech, Braverman delivered the sentence which I think is most revealing: “Could the ECHR be more transparent and accountable in how it interprets human rights, and give greater power to nation states to make arguments and present evidence?” I think we all know the answer to that question, and if Braverman truly believes her own rhetoric, so does she.

Frank Haviland is the Editor of The New Conservative, and the author of Banalysis: The Lie Destroying the West.

This piece first appeared in The European Conservative, and is reproduced by kind permission.

If you enjoy The New Conservative and would like to support our work, please consider buying us a coffee – it would really help to keep us going. Thank you!