UK politics live: Starmer says Tories used Brexit to run ‘open borders experiment’ in migration speech

Watch live as Sir Keir Starmer holds a news conference on migration.

The prime minister will hold a press conference on migration in Downing Street at 3pm on Thursday (28 November).

Home secretary Yvette Cooper has said that “serious damage” has been done to the immigration system - as net migration figures showing that the UK’s population grew by 906,000 people in 2023 are revealed.

Commenting on the latest figures, she said: “In the space of four years net migration rose by almost five times to a record high - that shows the serious damage that was done to the immigration system, the lack of proper controls in place, and the over reliance on a big increase in overseas recruitment. Net migration is still four times higher than it was at the beginning of the last parliament and we are clear that it needs to come down.”

Keir Starmer is set to be invited to a meeting of EU leaders in what will be seen as a sign of success for his plans for a great Brexit “reset’”.

It will be the first time a British prime minister has been asked to attend such a gathering since the UK’s exit from the European Union in 2020.

And it will be seen as an early win for Sir Keir’s plans to improve the UK’s damaged relationship with the bloc in the wake of Brexit.

Kate Devlin reports

The number of Vietnamese migrants arriving to the UK on small boats has jumped by 177 per cent year-on-year, according to new data on Channel crossings.

Home Office figures published on Thursday showed that from January to September this year the two most common nationalities making perilous journeys across the Channel were Afghans and Vietnamese.

Compared to the same nine-month period last year, the number of Afghan arrivals has decreased by 14 per cent, but the number of Vietnamese is up by a staggering 177 per cent.

Some 3,132 Vietnamese small boat migrants made the journey from January to September this year - up from 1,306 in the whole of 2023.

Holly Bancroft reports

Net migration to the UK has fallen this year, after reaching a record high of more than 900,000 in 2023 - 166,000 more than previously thought.

It fell to 728,000 in the year to June 2024, a decline of 20 per cent. But this came after net migration figures for the year to June 2023 were revised upwards to 906,000 from the initial estimate of 740,000, provisional data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) indicates.

A similar change was made for the year to December 2023, which was initially estimated to be 685,000, and is now thought to be 866,000 – an increase of 181,000.

Millie Cooke reports

Matt Hancock has urged MPs to back Kim Leadbeater’s assisted dying bill, recounting his experience with a constituent suffering from terminal cancer who begged him to change the law.

The former health secretary told The Independent it is time for the law to change, saying it is wrong that some people are “still forced to have very painful deaths”.

“I can remember the moment that I changed my mind and became in favour of assisted dying when I was health secretary”, Mr Hancock said, telling the story of David Minns, one of his Suffolk constituents, who died last year.

Millie Cooke reports

Reform UK chairman Zia Yusuf has announced that the party now has more than 100,000 members, up from around 15,000 a year ago.

“Momentum and trajectory are much more important than absolute position,” he told assembled press at a conference in London.

The party is polling around 20 per cent, also up from around 10 per cent this time last year. It means Reform is closing in on the Tory membership figure of 131,680.

Nigel Farage has promised to slash illegal migration by leaving the European Convention on Human Rights if Reform UK wins the next election.

The Reform leader said there is “nothing we can do” to stop illegal immigration inside the convention. “When it comes to legal immigration, it’s perfectly clear that the more low-skilled people we take in, the poorer the rest of the population gets,” Mr Farage said.

He added: “During six of the last eight quarters, GDP per capita has fallen, whilst net migration figures have legally reached the highest number ever.

“The link is clear. We have to drastically reduce the numbers coming into Britain.”

Former Tory MP Dame Andrea Jenkyns has joined Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, and will stand for the party as its candidate for the newly created Lincolnshire mayoralty next year.

“Today I have joined the party of the brave,” she said after being unveiled at a press conference in London.

The move is a blow to Kemi Badenoch, as Ms Jenkyns was an influential figure on the right of the Tory party under Rishi Sunak.