Welsh Labour figures condemn Starmer's use of Enoch Powell-style language in immigration speech

Martin Shipton

Prominent Welsh Labour figures have repudiated the language used by Keir Starmer in setting out what he sees as the need for tighter immigration controls.

In a speech on May 12, the Prime Minister said: "Nations depend on rules – fair rules. Sometimes they’re written down, often they’re not, but either way, they give shape to our values.

"They guide us towards our rights, of course, but also our responsibilities, the obligations we owe to one another. Now, in a diverse nation like ours, and I celebrate that, these rules become even more important. Without them, we risk becoming an island of strangers, not a nation that walks forward together.”

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'Rivers of blood'

Comparisons were immediately made with an infamous speech made by Conservative MP Enoch Powell in 1968, in which the then Shadow Cabinet Minister predicted that immigration would lead to “rivers of blood” in British cities and towns.

Mr Powell also stated in the speech: “While, to the immigrant, entry to this country was admission to privileges and opportunities eagerly sought, the impact upon the existing population was very different. For reasons which they could not comprehend, and in pursuance of a decision by default, on which they were never consulted, they found themselves made strangers in their own country.

“They found their wives unable to obtain hospital beds in childbirth, their children unable to obtain school places, their homes and neighbourhoods changed beyond recognition, their plans and prospects for the future defeated; at work they found that employers hesitated to apply to the immigrant worker the standards of discipline and competence required of the native-born worker; they began to hear, as time went by, more and more voices which told them that they were now the unwanted.”

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Edward Heath

Mr Powell’s speech led to his dismissal from the Shadow Cabinet by then Tory leader Edward Heath, who two years later became Prime Minister after defeating the Labour government led by Harold Wilson.

Left-wing Labour MP Nadia Whittome said anti-migrant rhetoric from Starmer’s government was “shameful and dangerous”. The MP for Nottingham East said: “To suggest that Britain risks becoming ‘an island of strangers’ because of immigration mimics the scaremongering of the far-right.”

In response to Sir Keir’s speech, David Davies, who was Mark Drakeford’s senior special adviser for a time when he was First Minister, wrote a social media post in which he stated: “I am a Welsh Labour Party member and will remain so after this post.

“I just need to put on record for those that know me that I completely distance myself from Keir Starmer’s speech on immigration. Drawing on rhetoric almost indistinguishable from Enoch Powell is unforgivable.

“To have a sustainable indigenous population requires a fertility rate 2.1. The UK rate is 1.4. This means our indigenous population is shrinking and aging and we are completely dependent on immigrants to remain a viable country.

“We should be welcoming and hospitable to people from other countries which we need to remain a functioning economy and caring society.

“In Wales, of the Labour voters we have lost, three out of four have left us to support other progressive parties. Apart from being morally reprehensible, believing we compete with Reform by being like Reform is innumerate and irrational.

“So I will remain Welsh Labour and fight hard to return Eluned Morgan, who is a decent caring leader as First Minister. But I will not have myself associated with this shameful dog whistle politics of the UK Government.”

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Alun Davies

Mr Davies’ post was liked by Alun Davies, the Labour MS for Blaenau Gwent, and Kirsty Keenan, a Welsh Government SpAd (special adviser), who is Eluned Morgan’s closest aide, having worked for her since shortly after the First Minister was elected to the then National Assembly in 2016.

In a press briefing, the Prime Minister’s official spokesperson denied that the similarity of the words in his speech to that of Powell had been deliberate.