Put migrants in tents instead of hotels, says Reform's first mayor
Reform UK's first mayor has called for migrants to be housed in tents instead of hotels.
Dame Andrea Jenkyns, the first elected mayor of Greater Lincolnshire, made the comment as she called for 'an end to soft touch Britain' in her victory speech following local elections on Thursday.
The remarks prompted some rival candidates to walk off stage during her speech.
The former Tory MP, who defected to Reform last year, also claimed she had been the victim of a 'soul-destroying' smear campaign from political rivals.
It came after Reform won the Runcorn and Helsby by-election, defeating Labour by just six votes.
Speaking on Friday morning at Grimsby Town Hall, Dame Andrea said: 'The fightback to save the heart and soul of our great country has now begun.
'Now that Reform is in a place of power, we can help start rebuilding Britain. Inch by inch, Reform will reset Britain to its glorious past.
'We will tackle illegal migration. We've been working on policies.
'I say no to putting people in hotels. Tents are good enough for France, they should be good enough for here in Britain.'
Immigration 'most important' issue to Reform voters
A poll earlier this week found that two-thirds of those planning to vote Reform said their most important concern was 'national policies on immigration'.
Nigel Farage, the party's leader, has committed to an effective freeze on non-essential migration, action to tackle illegal Channel crossings and pulling the UK out of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Meanwhile, Sir Keir Starmer, the Prime Minister, is planning to unveil new measures on immigration in the aftermath of the local election results.
A white paper is expected to reveal Government plans to make it harder for foreign students who come to the UK on graduate visas to stay in the country by taking low-paid jobs such as healthcare roles.
Home Office insiders insisted the plans had been in progress since November, rather than being a knee-jerk reaction to the local elections.
Asylum hotels were a controversial issue during the local election campaigns.
In Runcorn, Karen Shore, Labour's candidate, was accused of hypocrisy after vowing to close down a local asylum hotel – despite 'warmly welcoming' Afghan and Syrian refugees.
Figures published earlier this year revealed the number of asylum seekers housed in hotels had risen by more than 8,000 since last July's general election, despite Labour's pledge to end their use.
After securing an overwhelming victory for Reform in Greater Lincolnshire, Dame Andrea hit out at both the Conservative and independent candidates.
During the election campaign, she claimed the Tories had called the police on her and had implied she had slept with political friends, claims which were strongly denied.
Her eligibility to stand was also questioned by Marianne Overton, an independent, who alleged she did not live in the area.
Reform 'gives people hope'
Dame Andrea said: 'I've never experienced such negativity and soul-destroying campaigns against me like this one.
'The independent's husband pushed for a hearing at the council, my barrister had to represent me. The case was dismissed.
'The campaign was also filled with irony as one of the candidates stated I was parachuted in – she said in her South African accent.'
The comment drew murmurs from those watching, as she added: 'They undemocratically tried to remove me from the ballot but I will say no more on this.'
When questioned afterwards by reporters, she said: 'What I meant is how can they say I'm parachuted in when I've spent most of my life in Lincolnshire?'
She then refused to answer any follow-up questions and said it had been a 'little play on words' which was 'a little joke because of the irony'.
Speaking to The Telegraph after her victory, she said: 'Reform gives people hope. '
'A lot is resting on us – it's about showing we can have common sense policies in local areas and to me it's about having a blueprint of a manifesto which we can then use in government.'
She added that 'God-awful Labour' had inspired her back into politics.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The National
28 minutes ago
- The National
Scotland trapped in doom spiral of disappointment under Labour
WHEN it was put to him that his notorious Vow – which promised a federal UK within three years of a No vote – had failed to deliver anything remotely close to federalism, Gordon Brown infamously and patronisingly dismissed complaints with an airy: 'Look at the small print.' That's a caveat which always needs to be borne in mind whenever the Labour Party makes a promise, especially a promise to the people of Scotland. You might have thought that anyone in Scotland tempted to vote Labour might have learned that lesson by now, but obviously not. Labour keeps lying and people keep voting for them. As long as they do, Scotland is trapped in a doom spiral of continual disappointment. (Image: free) In the latest iteration of Brown's, above, injunction to look at the small print, the Labour Government has yet again watered down its commitment to create a new publicly owned renewable energy company based in Scotland. The litany of broken promises regarding Great British Energy is long and dismal. We discovered shortly before last year's Westminster general election that the company would not in fact be an energy company in any commonly understood sense of the term. READ MORE: Kemi Badenoch questions Reform UK and Labour 'belief in the Union' GB Energy would not generate energy to sell to consumers, nor would it own any energy infrastructure. Instead, it was to be an "investment vehicle" for funnelling public money into privately owned renewable energy projects. Last year, Keir Starmer announced that his government would invest £8.3 billion into the state-owned clean energy company in a bid to invest in renewable energy projects and decarbonise the entire UK electricity system by 2030. We were also promised that the new company would create 1000 jobs in Aberdeen, where we were assured that it would have its headquarters. It was clear by this point that these jobs would mostly be low level office based administration jobs, not highly skilled trades positions which might be attractive to the offshore oil workers who face losing their jobs as the industry in the North Sea winds down. We later discovered that Jürgen Maier, the new company's chair, would continue to work from an office in Salford in Greater Manchester, which, the last time anyone checked, is not in Aberdeen. We also learned that the new company would not have its own dedicated office building but would share premises with other governmental departments. Most damningly of all, we found out that the 1000 new jobs which the company was supposedly creating in Aberdeen would not actually materialise for 20 years. As if all these betrayals were not enough, a new insult has now been added to the existing injury. It came out in Chancellor Rachel Reeves's spending review that GB Energy will now have to share the promised £8.3bn in funding with a new body which will invest in nuclear energy. The Treasury's spending plans said that Great British Energy and 'Great British Energy – Nuclear', which was quietly renamed from Boris Johnson's Great British Nuclear a day before the spending review, would now split the funds, with £2.5 billion going towards a new generation of small modular nuclear reactors. This leaves £5.8 billion to be invested in renewable energy projects, a very far cry from the £28 billion which the party had been promising to invest in green industries back in 2023 when Labour was still in opposition. In shades of Gordon Brown's patronising small print comment, when asked about the decision to hive off a large chunk of the funding promised to GB Energy to develop green renewable energies and spend it on nuclear instead, a Whitehall source told The Guardian newspaper: "This has always been part of our plans, but I think perhaps not everyone was paying attention." READ MORE: Unionists just don't view the status quo the same way we do So there you go. It's not that the Labour Party has been underhand and duplicitous yet again – it's all our fault for not paying attention to a change that Labour made in the dead of night, a change which they knew would immediately be buried in the media attention given to the headline announcements in the spending review. SNP MSP Bill Kidd said: 'The fact Labour is raiding its promised funding for GB energy to spend on nuclear is shocking but not surprising. "Scotland is already a global leader in renewable energy, and we generate far more electricity than we consume. Our priority must be a just transition that delivers long-term economic opportunities for all - not more nuclear.' Tories trapped in a death spiral The Tories are due to hold their Scottish conference in Edinburgh this weekend as the party faces an existential crisis. In recent weeks it has lost a dozen councillors to the Nigel Farage fan club, with yet another Aberdeenshire Tory defecting on Thursday. Meanwhile, the Tory group in Dumfries and Galloway council has disintegrated amidst bitter in-fighting with seven of the council's 16 Conservatives departing, four to form a group called Novantae – the name of the Celtic tribe which inhabited the region during the Iron Age – and three to create the Dumfries and Galloway Independent Group. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch speaking at the party's Edinburgh conference (Image: PA)Despite selecting a candidate who is a member of the Orange Order in a blatant attempt to appeal to the sectarian vote in the recent Hamilton, Larkhall, and Stonehouse Holyrood by-election, the Tory vote collapsed to single figures. They only narrowly avoided the humiliation of a lost deposit as their voters deserted them en masse for the even more vile Reform UK, which appears to be hoovering up the staunch vote. With an unpopular and uninspiring leader in the form of Kemi Badenoch, and with Reform UK outflanking the Tories on the right, the Conservatives seem trapped in a death spiral. They won't be missed.
The National
28 minutes ago
- The National
SNP could have got the votes to win had they backed this petition
In the run-up to the by-election the SNP leadership played the well-worn Westminster political 'first past the post' tactic. That is, not to try to promote your own policies but to claim that a vote for your candidate will prevent the 'much worse' party winning the seat. That way there's no need to make any promises or commitments to the electorate, you just claim to be much better than the party you claim is likely to win the seat if your party fails to win it. READ MORE: Israel launches second wave of major strikes on Iran John Swinney insisted on claiming that the outcome of the election would be a win for either SNP or the unknown Reform UK candidate, so that voting SNP was required to stop the neo-fascist Farage bunch from taking the seat, and in doing so, getting a foothold in Scotland. He offered no evidence to back this up, just his own political wisdom and in following this strategy, allowed Labour's 'invisible man' to quietly take the seat with practically no campaign – Labour were probably looking on and thinking it would be rude to interrupt! We now know that John's political wisdom was widely off the mark, indeed his claim that Reform was doing so well probably played into the Farage media hype, which is the core of the Reform organisation, and to that extent helped them in the election. This was a disaster for the SNP, losing a seat that they've held since its introduction in 2011. So again, the only winner was political apathy and disillusionment, with a turnout of only 44.2% compared to 63.2% in 2021, John Swinney seemed to imply this was a reasonable result? I know that in the run-up to this election, the SNP candidate Katy Loudon asked SNP members and the wider constituency for their support. Andy Anderson, the national convener of the Respect Scottish Sovereignty movement, responded to Katy, asking her to give her support to petition PE2135 on Scottish human rights which is currently before the Scottish Parliament. Andy said if she would do this, he would talk to RSS supporters in the constituency and seek their help to get her elected. RSS has about 7000 supporters in Scotland and hundreds of these supporters are in that constituency, so getting their active support for the SNP candidate could have been decisive in the outcome of this election. So how did Katy respond? She didn't. Andy prompted her again. No response. It seems it was more important to the SNP leadership to keep their options open to undermine the UN human rights of the Scottish people than to win a by-election. The Scottish people will not tolerate this, we will persist in our struggle for Scottish human rights and for direct democracy, and this RSS petition is an important part of that struggle. Apathy and political disillusion will not continue to dominate our electoral system. So, if the SNP want a viable political future in Scotland, they had better pay attention to the human rights of the Scottish people and start to respond to this issue. Paddy McCarthy via email IT is always a good way to finish the working week, witnessing the complete meltdown with associated frothing at the mouth of the extremists, those whot love to label themselves as 'Reform'. The followers of Farage – yes, he that is nothing more than a 'market-stall Trump' – dislike having their twisted ideology questioned. Which is in itself a classic reaction by those with leanings towards the totalitarian state. Their disdain for human rights, obsession with national security, and want of suppression of workers' rights all point to the fascist way of thinking. Yet if you were to ask them what their goal is? Their answer is that all they crave is their country back? They are, of course, unable to state where they wish to bring their country back from. But they know that the problems facing the UK could be solved by putting machine guns on the Channel crossing points, kicking out everyone who does not look the same, speak the same, or prays to a different god! After all, are they nothing more than an invasion force sitting in our midst just waiting for the call? Which is similar to the scaremongering used before the start of the First World War. Then it was directed at the German waiters in London, who were supposedly all serving officers in the Kaiser's army. The rancid press also stated that thousand of rifles with even more ammunition had been pre-placed in the UK for use by the waiters/officers! Oh, how they crave to have the country returned to a time of smartly dressed obedient children, with housewives equally smartly dressed doing their daily shopping at local shops. A time that did not exist outside of the BBC. The fascists will not accept that they are being manipulated by politicians who are, by their nature, dangerous, corrupt of ideology, and vile in deed. Scotland as a matter of urgency must separate from that breeding ground of rancid thought that is Westminster. Only through independence and rejoining our friends in Europe (in whatever form) shall we halt this goose-stepping into the abyss of intolerance and authoritarianism. Cliff Purvis Veterans for Scottish Independence 2.0 AN excellent article by Dr Mark McNaught on the advantages of the Efta/EEA over the EU for an independent Scotland (Jun 11). In particular, he calls out the EU's now blatant and highly dangerous military ambitions. What he doesn't mention, however, is that Scotland would be a net contributor to the EU. Latterly the UK was paying around £9 billion annually, the equivalent of more than £150 per adult. Given that Von der Leyen and co are hell-bent on admitting the ultimate basket case, Ukraine, that figure would be a lot higher. George Morton Rosyth
ITV News
30 minutes ago
- ITV News
Assisted dying: Safeguard for children and ban on advertising added to bill by MPs
Health professionals would not be allowed to raise the subject of assisted dying with child patients and advertising for such a service would be banned, MPs have said. The new parts to the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill were voted in on Friday as a second day of debate on various amendments came to a close. It is expected the next major vote on the overall bill will take place next Friday, which could see it either fall or pass through to the Lords. Impassioned debate heard the bill described by Conservative MP Kieran Mullan as a 'deeply consequential and highly contentious piece of legislation for our society'. He argued not enough time has been allocated for debate on such a divisive issue, but health minister Stephen Kinnock said there had been more than 90 hours of parliamentary time spent so far, and more than 500 amendments had been considered at committee stage earlier this year. On Friday a majority of MPs approved a new clause, tabled by Labour MP Dame Meg Hillier, to ensure medics cannot raise the topic of assisted dying with under-18s. Her separate amendment to prevent health workers from bringing up the issue with adult patients before they have raised it was voted down. The amendment on child patients was hailed as a 'first major Commons defeat' by opposition campaigners Care Not Killing which welcomed 'MPs removing the ability of doctors to raise unprompted assisted suicide with children'. A group of Labour MPs opposed to the proposed legislation called it an '11th hour rejection of the claims made about the safety of this bill' which 'proves that confidence is slipping away from it'. They also cautioned that MPs might not have a copy of the final bill by the time they vote 'on this life and death issue' next week, as some outstanding amendments will still be being considered on Friday morning. A ban on advertising assisted dying should the bill pass into law has also been approved. An amendment, by fellow Labour MP Paul Waugh, to limit exceptions on that ban did not pass. He said the ban as it stands has 'unspecified exceptions, which could make the ban itself worthless', warning online harms from ads about assisted dying on TikTok 'could be a reality without the tighter safeguards in my amendment'. A number of other amendments were passed, including a provision for assisted dying deaths to not automatically be referred to a coroner and around the regulation of substances for use in assisted dying. Other issues debated included an amendment requiring the Health Secretary to publish an assessment of the availability, quality and distribution of palliative and end-of-life care one year after the bill passing into law. Pledging her support for the amendment, which was tabled by Liberal Democrat Munira Wilson, Kim Leadbeater said MPs should not have to choose between supporting assisted dying or palliative care as it is not an 'either/or' conversation for dying people. She said palliative care and assisted dying 'can and do work side by side to give terminally-ill patients the care and choice they deserve in their final days', and urged MPs to support 'all options available to terminally ill people'. Ms Wilson's amendment is supported by Marie Curie, which said it is 'desperately needed as the end-of-life care system is in crisis, with huge gaps in services and a lack of NHS leadership on this vital part of our health and care system'. It is expected that this amendment will be voted on next Friday. One MP, who became emotional as she recalled the death of her husband who she said had been 'in extreme pain' with terminal cancer, urged her colleagues to 'mind our language' after words like 'murder' were used. Liberal Democrat MP Caroline Voaden, whose husband died of oesophageal cancer, said it is 'so wrong' to use such language. She said: 'This is about helping people die in a civilised way and helping their families not go through a horrendous experience of watching a loved one die in agony.' The beginning of Friday's session saw MPs add a new opt-out clause to the bill. The amendment, meaning no person including all health and social care professionals, can be obliged to take part in assisted dying had been debated and approved last month, but has now been formally added to the bill. The bill passed second reading stage by a majority of 55 during a historic vote in November which saw MPs support the principle of assisted dying. Demonstrators both for and against a change in the law once again gathered outside Parliament to make their views known on the bill. Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying which is in favour of a change in the law, said: 'Our country is closer than ever before to the safe, compassionate, and tightly regulated assisted dying law that so many people want, from all walks of life and every part of the country.' But former MP Caroline Ansell, from Christian Action Research and Education (Care), which opposes assisted dying, urged parliamentarians to vote against the bill. She said: 'It is irredeemably flawed in principle and in detail. Parliament should close the door to assisted suicide and focus on truly compassionate and life-affirming forms of support.' As it stands, the proposed legislation would allow terminally-ill adults in England and Wales, with fewer than six months to live, to apply for an assisted death, subject to approval by two doctors and a panel featuring a social worker, senior legal figure and psychiatrist. MPs are entitled to have a free vote on the bill and any amendments, meaning they vote according to their conscience rather than along party lines.
