In 2016, Nigel Farage gave millions of voters the impression that Brexit would reduce immigration into the UK.
He was wrong. After we left the EU in 2020, new migration shot up. Today, more than half a million people (mostly non-EU citizens) come to the country every year. For the first time, the UK has lost control of its borders: small boat crossings shot up almost immediately after we left the EU.
Nigel Farage was fundamentally wrong on Brexit. He said it would give us control of our borders. In reality, it caused us to lose control.
But, he insists, he’s right this time. Just - forget about Ukip, forget about the Brexit Party, forget about Grassroots Out - his Brexit campaign. Reform UK has definitely, 100%, figured it out this time - he tells us.
Except: he hasn’t. His uncosted policies combine a sprinkle of far-right nationalism with a dash of communism. It’s as if he looked at a map of failed states and tried to get a bit of everything into his manifesto.
The immigration paradox
Voters think that Farage would stop immigration: but he won’t stop it. He’s said he would stop non-essential immigration. But here’s what would really happen: Farage would attempt to freeze immigration, industries would suffer huge workforce shortages and lobby that their sector is classed as essential, Farage would panic-issue masses of visas to shore up that sector, and immigration would go up.
How do I know? Well, it’s already happened. Brexit caused a huge exodus of European workers. Suddenly, the jobs they once did were left vacant. One example: HGV drivers. Consumers got annoyed that their stuff was delayed, businesses went ballistic at the government, and Boris panic-issued thousands of new visas for lorry drivers: increasing immigration.
The exact same thing just happened in Italy, where far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has just approved 500,000 work visas: despite pledging to cut immigration.
Reducing immigration is really not as simple as just shutting the doors. If it was, don’t you think countless previous governments would have done it?
On small boats, Farage says he will “pick up illegal migrants out of boats and take them back to France.” But France will, obviously, say no: you can’t land your ships and drop off people here. And if we do so anyway without their blessing, then we’ve fundamentally committed an act of war against France. It’s a non-starter: it’s a plan that won’t work. Of course we need to stop small boat crossings: we need to stop them in a way that works, not a way that creates an escalatory feud with our nearest neighbour.
It’s the same problem with Farage’s pledge to “deport foreign prisoners”: that’s already government policy! The trouble is that, unsurprisingly, countries don’t want their criminals back. So what can we do? Catapult them over the border? Smuggle them in?
At his last event, Farage revealed that he would, in fact, be negotiating with countries to ensure the return of their illegal migrants and prisoners. Which is exactly what the current government is trying to do. Farage will just do it over a pint, maybe?
Economic blowback
Liz Truss made a series of unfunded spending pledges that sent the economy spiralling and mortgage rates soaring. Prime Minister Farage would do exactly the same thing (except, with another pint maybe?). He wants to spend billions on his immigration plans alone. His NHS pledges are ridiculously expensive and completely uncosted. While increasing spend, he wants to dramatically cut taxes.
He saw Corbyn’s magic money tree and raised him a magic money forest. At the same time, he wants to mirror Elon Musk’s DOGE. It’s like cancelling Netflix to save money, while spending £400,000 on a fully equipped home cinema. I’m generally pro-investment: but a lot of Reform’s planned spend goes abroad, to other countries or even directly to illegal immigrants to incentivise their return. Quite literally, funnelling taxpayer money into foreign countries.
None of this even mentions the cultural harms that Farage would do as Prime Minister, the ethics of leaving and rewriting human rights conventions, and the fact that his party is made up of loons and losers who may be entertaining to watch, but whose talents are better suited to running piss-ups in breweries - but not much more.
Reform is hard-right, and one study of hard-right governments since 1945 found that, over a 15 year period, they lowered GDP per person by 10%. They crash the economy and trash the culture time and time again.
The definition of insanity, some say, is doing the same things and expecting different results. Despite a line of failed projects behind him, Farage insists this one will work. And despite lifting some ideas straight out of what is already government policy, Farage insists he can make them work in a way no one else has been able to. He’s lying, or he’s wrong, or he’s some combination of both. His diagnosis of the issues might be correct, but his plans simply won’t work. He’s just plain wrong.