Shadow Foreign Secretary Priti Patel has been rebuked by Tory leader Kemi Badenoch after she defended sky-high immigration under the Conservatives when she was Home Secretary. The Telegraph has more.
The Shadow Foreign Secretary – who was Home Secretary at a time of rising immigration – declined to apologise for the increase during an interview with the Sun.
Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, said it proved that the Conservatives were “proud of mass migration”.
Dame Priti’s comments were in stark contrast to those of Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, who made a speech in November to admit that the party had “got it wrong” on immigration.
On Thursday evening, in response to Dame Priti’s interview, a spokesman for Mrs Badenoch said: “As Kemi said when she committed to a hard cap on visas in November, under her leadership the Conservative Party will tell the truth about the mistakes we made.
“While the last Conservative Government may have tried to control numbers, we did not deliver.”
Appearing on the Sun’s Never Mind The Ballots YouTube show, Dame Priti was challenged over the fact that 1.2 million people entered the UK last year.
The former Home Secretary under Boris Johnson from 2019 to 2022, said: “We should first of all recognise that we ended free movement…
“It’s legal migration. People who come here and work and contribute to our economy, the brightest and the best.
“Look at the points-based immigration system: for the first time ever we have a points-based immigration system, counting people in and out. You can turn off the immigration system at any stage in terms of what our economy needs and doesn’t need.”
The show host Harry Cole, the Sun’s Political Editor, asked whether Dame Priti, who played a leading role in the 2016 EU referendum, wanted to apologise for vowing to tame immigration only to “throw open the borders”.
She replied: “That’s totally distortionary and that’s not true. And to be quite frank, we made it quite clear it would be people from the rest of the world, people with skills based on our economy. I think people should apologise for saying…
“People in the pandemic came here, health and social care visas, what would have happened to our NHS? Are we now saying we don’t need those people in our NHS?” …
On Thursday night a spokesman for Mrs Badenoch said: “We are now developing a detailed plan on immigration to put before the British public before the next election, so voters have a clear choice: Labour, who will keep immigration far too high; or a new plan and a hard cap on numbers with Kemi’s Conservatives.”
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