LABOUR is facing calls, both internally and from its enemies, that it should become even more anti-migrant in its policies and rhetoric in order to stave off the growing threat of Reform UK. This is a morally and politically bankrupt approach that will lead Labour to disaster. 

If anyone doubts that, just take a look at some of the traditional left parties in Europe who have trodden that path, they have largely been reduced to a rabble.

The BBC reports that a group of “around 40 MPs” calling themselves the Red Wall group are calling in the government for a stronger message on immigration to stave off the electoral threat posed by Reform UK. 

At the same time, there has been the proposed revival of the odious Blue Labour group with effectively the same aim. It has received a shot in the arm with the invitation of its ideological leader Maurice Glasman to Donald Trump’s inauguration. This is a direct foreign intervention in British politics and specifically into Labour politics as the Maga reactionaries try to reshape Western politics in their own image.

Labour has also decided to boost Reform UK’s advertising, by issuing ads which mimic their content and style on deportations.

Finally, we will soon be forced to begin the fight against the latest Immigration Bill, which seeks to criminalise all asylum-seekers, in the face of international law which establishes their right to seek asylum. In the process it will also criminalise people who are the victims of people-trafficking. 

This is the latest instalment in the Labour leadership’s ridiculous “stop the boats” campaign. They persist in tying this millstone around Labour’s neck simply because the Daily Mail and Reform UK demand it.

As many of us have long argued the way to actually stop the boats is to re-establish safe and legal routes for genuine asylum-seekers to come to this country. Two or three well-staffed processing centres in northern France would allow genuine claimants, about three-quarters of all asylum applications, to come her safely and legally. They are entitled to under international law.

Instead, the government seems intent on chasing Reform UK, seemingly unaware that they occupy the gutter when it comes to racism. 

In all the decades of genuine multibillion-pound struggles, we have been unable to defeat organised crime gangs in drugs, in prostitution, fraud and host of other crimes. Yet ministers invite us to believe they can achieve this against criminals based overseas who need nothing more than an inflatable dinghy to ply their trade. Establishing safe and legal routes would devastate the demand for the dinghies.

There are two pieces of news which explain the backdrop to the current frenzy of political degeneration on immigration and racism. 

The first was the news that Labour is behind Reform UK in an opinion poll. This is part of a trend. Labour lost 10 points during the election campaign and a further 10 points since the election. The more the public sees of Starmerism, the less appealing they find it. This is a precipitate decline which would probably require a sharp change of course even to arrest. There is no sign of a change of policy, just the opposite.

Unfortunately, many Labour colleagues have drawn precisely the wrong conclusions from this polling. We are already a party which offers the false promise of “stopping the boats,” while also supporting unpopular wars and implementing austerity. Yet colleagues insist on doubling down on these failed policies. They are precisely the policies that have already led us to this low point in the polls.

The second important piece of news that forms the backdrop to recent developments is the economic assessment from the Bank of England which accompanied its latest small cut in interest rates. Effectively the bank, without uttering the phrase, forecasts that there will be a bout of “stagflation” in this country, meaning a period of economic stagnation combined with rising prices.

We have had no recovery in living standards worthy of the name ever since the Global Financial Crisis in 2008. Stagflation ahead means that living standards will fall further for most people, for workers, poor people and many ethnic minority communities especially.

That is why there is such agitation about migration and asylum-seekers. It is designed as pure distraction from economic woes. It is scapegoating.

Even if all the boats were stopped tomorrow, it would not make anyone in this country better off. It certainly will not stop the rise in the energy price cap, which the Bank of England believes will drive inflation up to 4 per cent. That rise in energy prices is driven purely by the profiteering of the energy companies. Energy prices on wholesale markets have been falling since their peak in mid-2022. The same applies to rents, to food prices and other basics. They are all being driven higher by profiteering.

It is very convenient to political parties dependent on their relationships with (and donations from) these profiteers to have a scapegoat. But these policies will never make anyone better off, and the political crisis driven by a dangerously false rhetoric will only grow.

To beat back the racists, we cannot concede to them. Labour’s sister parties in Europe have tried this with spectacularly bad results. The German SPD is polling in the mid-teens and will have to beg the right to be part of the next government led by the right. The Partie Socialiste in France polls in single digits and only maintains any parliamentary representation thanks to its alliance with the far left.

We must also tell the truth. It is quite true that Reform UK want to abolish the NHS and replace it with an insurance model. But first and foremost it is a party which promotes xenophobia and racism. This is the politics people are aping when they pretend to “fight” Reform UK.

We must also offer genuine solutions. The typical “red wall” seat has far less immigration than the national average. If, as claimed, this is what people are talking about in these seats, then their Labour MP has done too little in explaining the real issues. Typically, these seats have way below average pay and productivity, because they have had almost no investment. As a result, public services and life expectancy are also way below average.

We need genuine solutions to these real problems, not false promises on manufactured concerns. Above all, we must not concede an inch to the racists.

Diane Abbott is Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington.