'Nigel Farage can sod off': Home Secretary defends asylum reform

‘I’d rather people came through safe and legal routes’, the Home Secretary told ITV News Political Editor Robert Peston

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has told ITV News she makes “no apology” for her sweeping reforms of the asylum system.

Earlier, Mahmood had unveiled radical reforms, launching a package of changes which the government called the biggest in “modern history”.

She told the House of Commons that the UK was attracting too many applicants due to the “comparative generosity” of the UK’s laws compared to Europe. But she is facing a growing backlash from Labour MPs and criticism from her opponents.

Speaking to ITV News Political Editor Robert Peston later on Tuesday, the home secretary defended the reforms.

“I want to disincentivize people from getting on dangerous boats and coming across a very dangerous channel crossing, paying thousands of pounds while they do so to criminals,” she explained.

“I don’t want them to do that. I’d rather people came through safe and legal routes instead.

“And I make no apology for incentivizing a safe and legal route and disincentivizing illegal migration to this country.”

When Peston told the home secretary that Nigel Farage said she appeared to auditioning to join Reform, Mahmood replied: “Well, firstly, Nigel Farage can keep his opinions to himself.

“He can frankly sod off. I’m not interested in anything that he has to say.

“And let let me just say to to people of all political persuasions who are watching, I’m not making a political calculation here. I’m not making an election calculation here.

“It is my responsibility as the home secretary of this country, who can see a broken system, to work out how to fix that broken system and to work out what is the right thing to do and then to.”

Nigel Farage can “sod off” Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood tells ITV News

Asked why she thought her proposals would reduce the kind of racist abuse she herself has suffered, Mahmood said: “Look, there are some people who will never accept someone who looks like me, and others, as true Brits who have a right to be in this country.

“I’m not interested in talking to those people, their views are beyond the pale.

“But I do see a much bigger group of people who are resentful and angry about what they see as an unfair and out of control and broken system.

“And I do know it’s a human frailty. Resentment and anger ultimately can turn to hate. And I think if you’re a mainstream politician, that cares about unity in this country, it should bother you.”

Shabana Mahmood speaking about racism to ITV News Political Editor Robert Peston

Asked whether racism in this country would get worse without these reforms, she said that people from a migrant background like herself “suddenly feel like maybe their own presence in their own country is now being contested because everyone thinks this whole system is broken”.

She said the government had a responsibility “….to fix the broken system and in doing so to unite the country, but also to retain public consent for having an asylum system at all, because I do think that that is at risk if we carry on.”

Pressed about how many people the UK would be accepting via the safe and legal routes that the government wants to introduce, the home secretary admitted: “They will start modest to begin with….a few hundred to begin with, but they will grow with time.

“So this is the vision that I have for the system that we want to run, with multiple safe legal routes, community sponsorship being the preferred model, but also routes for skilled refugees and also for talented student refugees as well.”