Badenoch pushes immigrant agenda after rise of Reform

By Dylan Hughes

By Metin Ozer

Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has just topped a YouGov and Sky News poll, edging out Labour with 25% against their 24%, while the Conservative Party have fallen behind with a low percentage of 21%.   

Kemi Badenoch, new leader of the Tory party, in a bid to garner favour announced party plans to tighten immigration rules. This plan includes doubling the amount of time that an immigrant needs to have been in the UK for before applying for indefinite leave to remain (ILR) in the UK, with an increased wait time of a previous five years to now a shocking 10 years.  

As well as that, The Tories are also of the belief that you should only be able to apply for British citizenship after having ILR for 15 years, up from the current 12 months, nearly tripling the current wait time to get British citizenship when accumulated.  

If the policy were to go ahead, many immigrants would struggle living and working in the UK as ILR gives people the right to both live and work, with zero-time restraints.   

On top of all that, The Tories have stated that immigrants would also need to reach a certain number of conditions before applying for ILR. This includes not claiming benefits, or using social housing, and having no criminal record. If all these conditions are not met, they would be permanently barred from becoming a British citizen.   

The Tories would also want every migrant claiming ILR to prove that they are a net contributor to the economy, or they won’t be eligible for a British citizenship either.  

Badenoch also believes that there should be a hard cap on migrant numbers but failed to explain what it should be.