Keir Starmer has said he “deeply regrets” a speech in which he described the UK as being in danger of becoming an island of strangers without tough curbs on immigration.
The prime minister made the remarks in an interview withthe Observer, saying he should have read the speech more carefully and “held it up to the light a bit more”.
The speech, delivered in May to unveil Labour’s immigration policy, was criticised for seeming to echo Enoch Powell’s infamous 1968 “rivers of blood” speech which had claimed Britain’s white population would be “strangers in their own country”.
After the speech, Starmer’s official spokesperson insisted the prime minister “absolutely stands by” his language, including claims that mass immigration had done “incalculable damage” to the British economy.
However, speaking in the interview to his biographer, Tom Baldwin, Starmer said: “I wouldn’t have used those words if I had known they were, or even would be, interpreted as an echo of Powell. I had no idea – and my speechwriters didn’t know either. But that particular phrase – no – it wasn’t right. I’ll give you the honest truth: I deeply regret using it.”
In the interview, he talked about the firebomb attack on the door of his family home in London just hours before the speech. However, he stressed that he was not using the attack as an excuse for the language, or blaming his advisers, saying he himself should have paid more attention.
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He also acknowledged there were “problems with the language” in his foreword to the policy document that said the record numbers of immigrants entering the UK under the last government had done “incalculable damage” to the country.
He said it was the case that Labour had “became too distant from working-class people on things like immigration”, but said “this wasn’t the way to do it in this current environment”.
In his speech in mid-May, Starmer said: “Let me put it this way, nations depend on rules, fair rules. Sometimes they are written down, often they are not, but either way, they give shape to our values, guide us towards our rights, of course, but also our responsibilities, the obligations we owe to each other.
“In a diverse nation like ours … we risk becoming an island of strangers, not a nation that walks forward together.”
Afterwards, several Labour MPs questioned whether Starmer’s policies were fuelling racism. Sarah Owen, the Labour chair of the women and equalities committee, who is of Malaysian-Chinese heritage, said: “Chasing the tail of the right risks taking our country down a very dark path.
“The best way to avoid becoming an ‘island of strangers’ is investing in communities to thrive – not pitting people against each other.”
Nadia Whittome said anti-migrant rhetoric from the government was “shameful and dangerous”. The Labour MP for Nottingham East said: “To suggest that Britain risks becoming ‘an island of strangers’ because of immigration mimics the scaremongering of the far right.”