The moral and economic costs of Farage’s plan to deport up to 600,000 asylum seekers

Nigel Farage has set out a plan that he claims would lead to the mass deportation of up to 600,000 asylum seekers if Reform were to be elected to power. The plan involves ripping up human rights law, building costly detention infrastructure and potentially paying corrupt and totalitarian regimes billions to accept people put on deportation flights.Here are the key planks of the policies – and what the moral and economic costs would be.The UK would be an outlier among European democracies, in the company of only Russia and Belarus, if it were to leave the European court of human rights (ECHR).Opting out of treaties such as the 1951 UN refugee convention, the UN convention against torture and the Council of Europe anti-trafficking convention would also be likely to do serious harm to the UK’s international reputation

Nigel Farage accused of ‘ripping up’ human rights laws after unveiling plans for mass deportations - as it happened

The Liberal Democrats have condemned Reform’s mass deportation plans for “ripping up” human rights and involving potential payments to autocratic regimes.The party’s deputy leader Daisy Cooper said:(Nigel) Farage’s plan crumbles under the most basic scrutiny. The idea that Reform UK is going to magic up some new places to detain people and deport them to, but don’t have a clue where those places would be, is taking the public for fools.Of course Nigel Farage wants to follow his idol Vladimir Putin in ripping up the human rights convention. Winston Churchill would be turning in his grave

Peers who do not participate enough in House of Lords face sack

Labour plans to remove peers who do not contribute enough to the House of Lords and to press ahead with plans for a retirement age of 80 from the upper house.Writing for the Telegraph, the leader of the House of Lords, Angela Smith, said a select committee would consider the next stage of Lords reform after the abolition of hereditary peers.Lady Smith said that removing the last hereditary peers was “by no means the limit of the government’s Lords reform ambitions” but said the new committee would consider carefully how the next phase would work.The final stages of the bill, which will abolish the seats for the 86 remaining hereditary peers, will go through parliament this year.“The introduction of a mandatory retirement age for peers and a participation requirement are both clear among our stage-two manifesto commitments,” Smith said in her article, but said there should be a “collaborative way forward”

UK elections chief says children need lessons from 11 to be ready to vote at 16

Schools will need to give democracy lessons to children from the age of 11 and ask teachers to leave their politics at the classroom door to help prepare for votes at 16, the head of the UK elections watchdog has said.Vijay Rangarajan, the chief executive of the Electoral Commission, said democratic education would be rolled out at first to those aged over 14 in preparation for votes at 16 at the next election.However, he said this would ultimately need to start at age 11 in order for pupils to be in the best position to take advantage of being able to vote at 16 and 17.The Electoral Commission is preparing material to give to schools to help with democratic education, amid calls from some politicians, such as David Blunkett, for better preparation.In an interview with the Guardian, Rangarajan said huge work was going into the citizenship material to make it “impartial”, and said schools and teachers have a role in making sure they do not attempt to sway students in how to vote

Reform councillor works on asylum claims for Home Office, investigation reveals

Campaigners have complained to the Home Office after it was revealed a councillor for Reform UK also works for the government department processing asylum and immigration claims.Paul Bean, who serves as a councillor for Crook ward at Durham county council, declared his day job as a civil servant at the Home Office in his register of interests.His role emerged after an investigation by the anti-extremism organisation Hope Not Hate. The group found posts criticising asylum seekers on a social media account they claim belongs to Bean.“I work as an asylum decision maker for the HO [Home Office] and I can tell you with authority that 93% of asylum seekers to the UK are men between 18 – 35 and 92% of them are refused asylum,” posts on the account read, adding: “The truth is the vast majority of asylum seekers are actually economic migrants abusing the asylum system

‘Some brass neck’: Rayner’s allies rebuke Cleverly over council tax criticisms

Angela Rayner’s allies have hit back at James Cleverly, accusing the shadow housing secretary of having “some brass neck” for criticising the deputy prime minister over her council tax arrangements on a property she bought this year.Rayner acquired the seaside flat in Hove, East Sussex, for more than £700,000. The property is subject to the 100% council tax premium on second homes that was introduced in April, which she now pays in full.The Tories, including Cleverly, have accused the deputy prime minister of hypocrisy, pointing to her role in pushing through those tax rules and demanding clarity over whether she had been paying the premium and whether she claimed a single-person discount on her Admiralty House flat, the property that came with her ministerial position at the beginning of this year.Cleverly said: “She has admitted to paying the premium on her flat but she refuses to say whether she has been paying the second-homes premium on Admiralty House since it came into force in April