Brexit campaign leader Nigel Farage has warned “the old alliance of big business and a Tory government” is preparing to sell out the British public on immigration.
In an article for the Telegraph newspaper, the former UKIP supremo turned Fox and LBC commentator expressed his dismay that commitments to an Australian-style points system after Brexit – made by key Cabinet figures Boris Johnson and Michael Gove during the referendum campaign – appear to have been dropped without a trace by Theresa May’s administration, in favour of migration arrangements “shaped by the interests of our economy”.
Mr Farage appeared to indicate that this was a euphemism for the interests of big businesses and corporations which have grown accustomed to an effectively limitless supply of cheap labour from Central and Southern Europe, suggesting that “even Jeremy Corbyn is now offering a tougher line than the Government when he says he would ban the wholesale importation of low-skilled EU workers”.
“Every week Britain’s national debate focuses on the lack of available school places, shortfalls in NHS funding, overcrowding on our railways, or on the housing crisis,” Farage told readers.
“But rarely, if ever, does any member of the political class dare to voice the undeniable truth that immigration lies at the root of these difficulties. The talk is always of the economic benefits, never the capital costs of the infrastructure required.”
The veteran campaigner lambasted the “new consensus” that Free Movement would continue not only up to Brexit day in 2019, but probably for a further two-year “transition period” afterwards – meaning that “Britain will have to wait until at least 2021 – five years after the Brexit referendum – to take back control.”
He added: “Millions who voted Leave will feel cheated, and rightly so: it’s clear the great Brexit betrayal has begun.”
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