UK politics dwell: Farage pronounces defection of Leicestershire’s police and crime commissioner from Tories to Reform UK | Politics
Take a look at our newest merchandise
![[Netflix Certified & Auto Focus] Smart 4K Projector, VGKE 900 ANSI Full HD 1080p WiFi 6 Bluetooth Projector with Dolby Audio, Fully Sealed Dust-Proof/Low Noise/Outdoor/Home/Bedroom](https://i0.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71yY+2ryOZL._AC_SL1500_.jpg?w=300&resize=300,300&ssl=1)
![[Netflix Official & Auto Focus/Keystone] Smart Projector 4K Support, VOPLLS 25000L Native 1080P WiFi 6 Bluetooth Outdoor Projector, 50% Zoom Home Theater Movie Projectors for Bedroom/iOS/Android/PPT](https://i2.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71Emwd78tlL._AC_SL1500_.jpg?w=300&resize=300,300&ssl=1)
Farage pronounces defection of Leicestershire’s police and crime commissioner from Tories to Reform UK
Nigel Farage, the Reform UK chief, introduces a defector. It’s Rupert Matthews, the police and crime commissioner for Leicestershire and Rutland. He was elected to that publish as a Conservative in 2021. Earlier than that he was a Tory MEP.
Matthews claims the police are “combating crime with one hand tied behind their again”. He goes on:
The courts impose sentences that too typically are derisory and Labour’s early launch scheme signifies that crooks are again out after serving a fraction of their time in jail.
Now it’s all as a result of our prisons are full. They’re stuffed with international criminals who needs to be deported the day they’re convicted, not stored right here on the expense of British taxpayers.
It’s no marvel that criminals don’t concern the justice system, no marvel that the legislation abiding have virtually given up on reporting crimes, and our fantastic law enforcement officials are let down even by their very own senior commanders.
Key occasions
Q: Have you ever mentioned your issues concerning the On-line Security Act with the US vp, JD Vance?
Farage claimed he couldn’t keep in mind.
Q: Will Reform UK councillors block the usage of HMOs (homes in a number of occcupation) to accommodate asylum seekers?
Farage mentioned that was “completely” the place of Reform councillors. In some methods, the usage of HMOs by asylum seekers was “even worse” than the usage of motels.
Finch mentioned that in Warwickshire he needed to have the ability to inform residents the place HMOs housing migrants have been. He claimed not having the ability to do that was “harmful” and “towards safeguarding”. He additionally claimed this was “an enormous downside for the kids in Warwickshire”.
Farage claims Reform UK shedding a few of its ‘blokeish’ repute, partly as a result of its campaigning on sexual violence
Q: Since you’ve got been working a marketing campaign linking sexual crimes with migration, are you selecting up extra help from girls?
Farage replied:
I do assume one of many issues that’s occurred over the course of the previous couple of weeks is, no doubt, we’re undoubtedly seeing, not simply excessive profile girls coming to Reform – and also you’ve seen one or two of these on the stage right here and in Wales over the course of the previous couple of weeks – however I believe typically on the market there’s grave concern, notably amongst moms, about their youngsters, whether or not they can allow them to out.
So maybe this problem has spoken the reality to those that they’ve been feeling more and more for a while.
And I believe which may be that altering the complexion of how individuals view Reform.
Once I got here again into this final June, individuals regarded it as being a little bit of a blokeish get together – one thing to do my repute, I can’t fairly assume why.
However I believe that’s altering and altering very quickly. This marketing campaign could be very a lot part of that.
Q: Vanessa Frake is looking for supermax prisons. However they’re the costliest prisons to construct. How are you going to afford that?
Farage says he’s solely firstly of this marketing campaign. He suggests it’s too early for the get together to have full particulars.
Frake says she was not calling for supermax prisons. She was calling for a supermax regime in some prisons. That could possibly be carried out “comparatively simple”, she says.
Farage says coming from harmful nations like Afghanistan shouldn’t cease asylum seekers arriving in UK being despatched again
Q: The place ought to individuals be deported to if they arrive from a rustic that isn’t protected?
Farage replies:
Sorry. I’ve had sufficient of this. In the event you come from Afghanistan, you return to Afghanistan. Finish of.
This concept, we are able to’t ship individuals to sure nations, all of the false claims that individuals make about their very own private lives – I’m sorry. We’re completed. We’re completed. We’ve had sufficient.
Farage claims individuals too afraid to stroll by way of London at night time carrying jewelry
Q: Are you attempting to make individuals afraid, to get them to vote for you?
Farage replies:
No, they’re afraid. They’re afraid.
I dare you to stroll by way of the West Finish of London after 9 o’clock of a night carrying jewelry. You wouldn’t do it. You recognize that I’m proper. You wouldn’t do it, and that’s simply in London – not to mention what’s taking place in so many different components of the nation, and the real fears.
Linking this to immigration, he claims there are “some individuals who come from sure cultures that pose a hazard to our society”.
That is the contested declare raised by Robert Jenrick this morning. (See 9.53am.)
Farage is now taking questions.
Requested what Reform UK would do to cease the small boat crossings, Farage dismissed at the moment’s Residence Workplace announcement about £100m being spent on extra officers. (See 10.48am.) He mentioned the UK had already given £800m to France to handle the issue. However the boats have been nonetheless coming.
He mentioned individuals have been nonetheless arriving as a result of they knew they’d a “99% probability of staying”.
He mentioned the one efficient answer could be to show individuals away once they arrived. That’s what Australia did, he mentioned. He mentioned:
In the event you enter a rustic illegally, you may be detained and deported. That is what regular nations do everywhere in the world. We’ve surrendered normality to this new human rights regime.
George Finch, the Reform UK chief of Warwickshire county council, goes subsequent. (Aged 19, he’s the youngest council chief within the nation.)
He claims the police have opposed his makes an attempt to reveal the immigration standing of somebody arrested in reference to an alleged crime.
Former jail governor becoming a member of Reform UK as adviser requires US-style ‘supermax’ jail regimes for many critical offenders
Colin Sutton, a former police officer who’s now advising Reform UK on crime, introduces the subsequent speaker – Vanessa Frake, a former jail governor and writer of the memoir, The Governor.
Frake says when she went to Wormwood Scrubs, she was assigned the duty of cleansing up D wing, the place the lifers have been based mostly.
It was soiled, run down and had main drug points. My perspective to the duty was assertive and no nonsense. That’s the strategy that I’ll take for my position inside Reform UK [advising on crime].
She says the general public have misplaced religion in how prisons are run. Assaults on employees are up, drug use is up, and 1000’s of offenders are being launched early, she says.
She says the federal government has “appeased prisoners” who’ve been allowed to cook dinner their very own meals. This has led to assaults on employees, she says.
She says she needs a “more durable jail regime for prisoners who won’t ever be rehabilitated”, based mostly on the supermax prisons within the US.
However, for prisoners who can be launched, she needs extra deal with rehabilition, she says.
UPDATE: I up to date the headline after Frake mentioned (at 11.57am) that she was proposing having a supermax regime in prisons for essentially the most critical offenders, not constructing new supermax jails.
Farage pronounces defection of Leicestershire’s police and crime commissioner from Tories to Reform UK
Nigel Farage, the Reform UK chief, introduces a defector. It’s Rupert Matthews, the police and crime commissioner for Leicestershire and Rutland. He was elected to that publish as a Conservative in 2021. Earlier than that he was a Tory MEP.
Matthews claims the police are “combating crime with one hand tied behind their again”. He goes on:
The courts impose sentences that too typically are derisory and Labour’s early launch scheme signifies that crooks are again out after serving a fraction of their time in jail.
Now it’s all as a result of our prisons are full. They’re stuffed with international criminals who needs to be deported the day they’re convicted, not stored right here on the expense of British taxpayers.
It’s no marvel that criminals don’t concern the justice system, no marvel that the legislation abiding have virtually given up on reporting crimes, and our fantastic law enforcement officials are let down even by their very own senior commanders.
The Reform UK press convention is beginning now. There’s a dwell feed right here.
Scotland’s deputy FM Kate Forbes to stop Holyrood subsequent 12 months, saying she needs to spend extra time along with her younger household
Severin Carrell
Severin Carrell is the Guardian’s Scotland editor.
Kate Forbes, Scotland’s deputy first minister and former Scottish Nationwide get together management contender, has introduced she is quitting Holyrood on the subsequent election.
The information will shock her get together. Forbes has lengthy been regarded by centrists within the get together as a possible chief and was a favorite of many enterprise leaders and SNP MSPs aligned with former chief Alex Salmond.
She mentioned she had mirrored over the recess about whether or not to face once more at subsequent Could’s Scottish parliamentary election, however had determined to place her younger household first. In an announcement she mentioned:
I’ve grown up within the public eye, getting married, having a child and elevating a younger household. I’ve constantly put the general public’s wants forward of my household’s throughout that point. I’m grateful to them for accommodating the heavy calls for of being a political determine. Looking forward to the long run, I don’t wish to miss any extra of the valuable early years of household life – which may by no means be rewound.
However her assertion left open the likelihood she could stand once more at a later date, emphasising she didn’t want “to hunt re-election for an additional five-year time period within the Scottish parliament”.
Her determination to stop now can even spare Forbes of the problem of deciding whether or not or to not contest the management once more if Swinney quits after the 2026 election; many see the housing secretary Màiri McAllan because the favorite to succeed him.
An MSP within the Highlands, Forbes got here near successful the management and turning into first minister after Nicola Sturgeon stood down in February 2023, following some of the turbulent and combative campaigns of latest get together historical past.
Forbes overtly attacked lots of Sturgeon’s landmark insurance policies on social inclusion and accused her closest rival Humza Yousaf of incompetence, with the competition exposing important strains with their pro-independence companions the Scottish Inexperienced get together.
An lively member of the socially conservative Free Church of Scotland, which doesn’t admit girls as church ministers, she was accused in flip of taking regressive stances on abortion rights, equal marriage and the local weather disaster.
After Yousaf’s interval as first minister and get together management ended immediately following his disastrous determination to desert a coalition with the Greens, Forbes was introduced again in to function deputy first minister by John Swinney as he sought to regular the ship.
Forbes mentioned she loved the privilege of turning into a minister for public finance, then as cupboard secretary for finance (a publish she was given at extraordinarily quick discover after the then finance secretary stop on the eve of a funds) and most just lately as deputy first minister and cupboard secretary for financial system and Gaelic.
Angela Eagle, the Residence Workplace minister, was giving interviews this morning to advertise authorities plans to spend £100m hiring as much as 300 further Nationwide Crime Company officers. Right here is the Residence Workplace press launch, and Rajeev Syal has written the story up right here.
As Rajeev says, this was the third Residence Workplace announcement on this subject inside 24 hours, following affirmation of plans plans to introduce a brand new offence for promoting irregular small boat crossings and plans to fast-track the processing of asylum purposes.
Immediately the Instances studies that, as a part of the measures to restrict asylum purposes, the Residence Workplace will penalise universities that settle for international college students who’re primarily motivated by the will to assert asylum within the UK. Of their story Matt Dathan and Aubrey Allegretti report:
As a part of a contemporary authorities crackdown, universities can be penalised if fewer than 95 per cent of worldwide college students accepted on to a course begin their research, or fewer than 90 per cent proceed to the top. Establishments that settle for international college students will face sanctions if greater than 5 per cent of their visas are rejected.
The plans, that are anticipated to be introduced subsequent month, are designed to forestall the rising numbers of international nationals utilizing research visas to enter the UK after which declare asylum.
Dathan and Allegretti additionally say Yvette Cooper, the house secretary, is anticipated to signal the “one in, one out” returns cope with France, permitting round 50 small boat arrivals to be returned to France each week in trade for the UK accepting an equal variety of asylum candidates from France, on Wednesday.
In line with Mahri Aurora from Sky Information, Reform UK will announce a defection at their press convention.
NEW: Reform UK are holding a press convention at 11am at the moment by which they are going to unveil a defection from the Tory get together. They can even introduce former jail governor Vanessa Frake MBE as their new justice adviser.
The press convention can be held with them in addition to Farage and the Reform Warwickshire County Council chief George Finch.
In her interviews this morning Angela Eagle, the minister for border safety and asylum, was requested what her message was to individuals who have been protesting exterior motels used to accommodate asylum seekers. She informed Sky Information:
Anger doesn’t get you anyplace.
What we now have to do is recognise the values we now have on this nation, the rule of legislation we now have on this nation, the work we’re doing with the police to guard individuals.
We’ll shut asylum motels by the top of the parliament. We’ll do it sooner if we are able to.
And she or he informed Instances Radio:
Those that are anxious and demonstrating have an absolute proper to try this, as long as they do it peacefully.
Individuals don’t have a proper to then have a pop on the police, which has been taking place in some remoted circumstances exterior motels.
Truss accuses Badenoch of not telling reality about Tory failures
Kemi Badenoch, shouldn’t be telling the reality concerning the “actual failures of 14 years of Conservative authorities”, the previous Conservative prime minister Liz Truss has mentioned. Kevin Rawlinson has the story.
Angela Eagle pushes again at Tory claims linking small boat arrivals to sexual crime, saying strong information not obtainable
Good morning. Throughout August, when parliament shouldn’t be sitting and the faucet of home information is working dry, opposition events typically prefer to run campaigns. Nigel Farage, the Reform UK chief, is following this mannequin with gusto and at the moment, for the third week in a row, he’s holding a press convention with reference to crime. Reform’s success within the polls is sort of solely right down to the actual fact it advocates hardline insurance policies to chop immigration and small boat crossings and Farage is attempting explicitly to hyperlink this problem to crime, arguing that asylum seekers are disproportionately prone to be felony.
The Conservative get together don’t have a single theme for his or her summer season campaigning. (Yesterday Kemi Badenoch was campaigning concerning the uselessness of the Liz Truss mini-budget, a subject the place the nation largely agrees.) However in response to an in a single day announcement from the federal government about new measures to crack down on small boat crossings, they’ve additionally been depicting these migrants (whose numbers, in fact, elevated dramatically whereas they have been in workplace) as a risk to public security. In an announcement launched in a single day Chris Philp, the shadow residence secretary, mentioned: “This weak Labour authorities has misplaced management of our borders, and we now see rapes and sexual assaults by unlawful immigrants reported on a close to day by day foundation.” And, in an interview on the Immediately programme this morning, Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, doubled down on this declare. He mentioned:
I’m afraid there’s growing proof of a critical hyperlink between unlawful migration, migration typically, and crime, notably sexual crime towards girls and women.
In London, 40% final 12 months of all the sexual crimes have been dedicated by international nationals, even though they solely make up 25% of the inhabitants.
And among the information that – we’re seeing we don’t have good information in the meanwhile – among the information we’re seeing could be very hanging. Afghans and Eritrean nationals are 20 occasions extra prone to be convicted of a sexual crime than a British nationwide.
These are very surprising statistics.
Farage just lately informed the New Statesman, for an fascinating, prolonged profile written by Harry Lambert, that he thought Jenrick would “virtually definitely” finish as much as the fitting of him on migration by the subsequent election. “I believe he’ll in all probability go additional – that’s simply my intuition for somebody who needs to make noise,” Farage mentioned.
Angela Eagle, the minister for border safety and asylum, has been giving interviews this morning, and on the Immediately programme she advised that there was not agency information to again up the claims that Jenrick was making. She mentioned:
[Jenrick] did truly say that we don’t have good information in the meanwhile, and but he’s asserting with nice certainty information factors, and I don’t know the place he’s acquired them from. So it’s tough for me to criticise from an information viewpoint. However he’s admitted in that interview that we don’t have good information.
Requested if she thought that the Tories have been “taking part in with hearth” by linking asylum seekers with sexual crime, Eagle replied:
I believe that we have to cope with all crimes, all sexual crimes, no matter who has perpetrated them in the identical approach. And we have to crack down on violence towards girls and women, which is why we’ve truly acquired Jess Phillips, a minister, whose complete job is about doing that.
Requested if she was open to discussing potential hyperlinks between immigration and crime, Eagle replied:
I don’t thoughts having debates about something, however I believe we haven’t acquired good information on this, and I believe that we’ve acquired to take a look at the precept. And that’s that we’ve acquired to cope with all sexual criminality, whoever perpetrates it, in an virtually color blind approach.
If a woman has been abused by anyone or has been subjected to a vile sexual crime, it doesn’t actually matter what the color of the pores and skin of the perpetrator is.
As Eagle mentioned, it’s exhausting to evaluate the reality concerning the hyperlink between immigration and crime as a result of the info is sophisticated, and in some respects restricted. However one one who has tried is the researcher and scientist Emma Monk. On her Substack weblog she just lately printed an evaluation of the declare that some individuals arriving within the UK on small boats are 20 occasions extra possible than Britons to be felony. This can be a declare that Jenrick referenced, describing it as “surprising”. Monk argues that it’s shockingly inaccurate – or “ludicrous on a number of fronts”, to make use of her phrases. Her entire publish is value studying, however right here is her conclusion.
As you’ll be able to see, the declare that migrants arriving on small boats are 24x extra prone to find yourself in jail was a simple manipulation of accessible statistics. It wasn’t solely fabricated – they will level to ‘official statistics’ to assert credibility – however it’s clearly misinformation all the identical.
A Tory MP briefed it to a right-wing newspaper, which printed it unquestioningly. That was picked up by the remainder of the right-wing media ecosystem, and now the 24x determine is firmly within the minds of those that wish to imagine it, and is being repeated everywhere in the web, and throughout dinner tables and backyard fences.
There are solely two objects within the diary for at the moment.
11am: Nigel Farage, the Reform UK chief, holds a press convention.
11.30am: Downing Avenue holds a foyer briefing.
(For readers who maintain asking why we characteristic the Reform UK press conferences, however not the Lib Dem ones, or the Inexperienced get together ones, the reply is easy; they aren’t holding any.)
If you wish to contact me, please publish a message under the road when feedback are open (usually between 10am and 3pm in the meanwhile), or message me on social media. I can’t learn all of the messages BTL, however in case you put “Andrew” in a message aimed toward me, I’m extra prone to see it as a result of I seek for posts containing that phrase.
If you wish to flag one thing up urgently, it’s best to make use of social media. You possibly can attain me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, however particular person Guardian journalists are there, I nonetheless have my account, and in case you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I’ll see it and reply if crucial.
I discover it very useful when readers level out errors, even minor typos. No error is simply too small to right. And I discover your questions very fascinating too. I can’t promise to answer to all of them, however I’ll attempt to reply to as many as I can, both BTL or typically within the weblog.
![[Win 11&Office 2019] 14″ Rose Gold FHD IPS Display Ultra-Thin Laptop, Celeron J4125 (2.0-2.7GHz), 8GB DDR4 RAM, 1TB SSD, 180° Opening, 2xUSB3.0, WIFI/BT, Perfect for Travel, Study and Work (P1TB)](https://i3.wp.com/m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71CzO7Oc8jL._AC_SL1500_.jpg?w=300&resize=300,300&ssl=1)
