Badenoch suggests final Tory migration policy would be more radical than leaving European convention on human rights – as it happened

• Kemi Badenoch has said the Conservatives under her leadership are committed to having “a strict numerical cap” for immigration, “with visas only for those who will make a substantial and clear overall contribution”. During a speech and Q&A at Westminster, she also called for more data to be published on “the real costs and benefits of different types of migration”. (See 3.53pm.) Asked about leaving the European convention on human rights, she said she did not view it as a “silver bullet”, but that leaving the ECHR was “not even the most radical thing that we probably will have to do”. (See 4.02pm.)

• Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves have both declined to repeat the chancellor’s comments at the CBI conference on Monday, where she said she would not be “coming back with more borrowing or more taxes”. (See 2.10pm and 5.21pm.)

• Esther Rantzen, whose terminal cancer diagnosis led her to campaign for the legalisation of assisted dying, has issued an impassioned plea to MPs to vote this week on a “vital life-and-death issue”.

• Proposed cuts to England’s most beautiful landscapes pose an “existential threat”, the managers of the National Landscapes Association have warned.

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In her speech this afternoon Kemi Badenoch first raised a criticism of Keir Starmer first set out by the Guido Fawkes website. She said:

The prime minister himself once said that there is a ‘racist undercurrent’ which ‘permeates all immigration law’.

Starmer used that language in a review of a book published in 1987.

Badenoch did not seem to consider the possibility that at that point Starmer might have been right. Two years ago Amelia Gentleman got hold of an internal Home Office report written by a historian exploring the causes for the Windrush scandal and it made precisely this point. The report, which has not been published, said:

During the period 1950-1981, every single piece of immigration or citizenship legislation was designed at least in part to reduce the number of people with black or brown skin who were permitted to live and work in the UK …

As a result, the experiences of Britain’s black communities of the Home Office, of the law, and of life in the UK have been fundamentally different from those of white communities … Major immigration legislation in 1962, 1968 and 1971 was designed to reduce the proportion of people living in the United Kingdom who did not have white skin.

The leftwing Byline Times was not allowed to attend the Kemi Badenoch speech, Adam Bienkov, its editor, says. He posted this on Bluesky earlier.

Kemi Badenoch and Chris Philp are currently holding a press conference about immigration at a Tufton Street think tank. Byline Times was barred from attending

At PMQs Keir Starmer refused to repeat what Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, told the CBI about future tax rises being ruled out. (See 2.10pm.)

Reeves herself has also refused to repeat what she told the CBI.

In an interview today, asked how she could guarantee “I’m not coming back with more borrowing or more taxes” (which is what she told the CBI), Reeves replied:

I’m not going to write five years’ worth of budgets in the first few months as chancellor of the exchequer.

But what I can now say is that we have wiped the slate clean on their economic and fiscal mismanagement of the previous government.

At the CBI conference on Monday Reeves did tell the audience that she would not be coming back “with more borrowing or more taxes”. But she was speaking off the cuff, not from notes, and the main point she was making was that she did not expect to have to deliver a big, tax-raising budget like October’s ever again. It did not sound as if she was making a pledge never to raise any tax, and it is likely that most people in the audience did not interpret her words as a cast-iron pledge of that kind.

(In politics, as well as reporting what people say, it is also important to make allowance for what they mean.)

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Labour claims Kemi Badenoch’s speech on immigration this afternoon shows the Conservatives have ‘“learned nothing” from the their time in government. In a statement on the speech issued by the Labour party, Angela Eagle, the minister for border security and asylum, said:

It’s welcome the Tories finally accept that immigration spiralled out of control on their watch. But Kemi Badenoch offers no new ideas or alternative to her party’s failed policies of the past.

The Conservatives wasted hundreds of millions of pounds in taxpayers’ cash on the Rwanda gimmick, and it’s clear they would do it all over again. The Tories have learned nothing.

The Proclaimers will perform at a memorial service for Alex Salmond taking place on St Andrew’s Day, PA Media reports. PA says:

The service at St Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh will be streamed live from 11am on Saturday.

Salmond, a pivotal figure in Scottish politics for several decades, died aged 69 on 12 October in North Macedonia after having a heart attack.

A private family funeral was held near his home in Strichen, Aberdeenshire, on 29 October.

The order of service for the memorial shows that as well as the Proclaimers – the rock duo from Leith – music will also be provided by singers Dougie MacLean and Sheena Wellington.

A number of Salmond’s friends and political allies will give readings at the service, officiated by Rev Dr George J Whyte.

Tributes will be delivered by Kenny MacAskill – a longtime ally of Mr Salmond who joined the Alba Party – as well as the former first minister’s lawyer Duncan Hamilton KC, and Salmond’s niece Christina Hendry.

SNP MSP Fergus Ewing will read from The Wild Geese by Violet Jacob.

Conservative MP David Davis, who shared a friendship with Salmond despite a political divide, will read from John 14.

The Proclaimers will perform their pro-independence song Cap In Hand.

But the Conservative press conference does seem to have riled Reform UK a bit. The party has issued this response from its leader, Nigel Farage.

The Conservative party have broken their promises on immigration after the 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019 manifestos.

Why on earth would I or anyone else believe them now.

Kemi Badenoch suggested during the Q&A that, without Reform UK standing at the last election, Labour would not have won. In response to a question about whether she was just making this announcement to address the rise of Reform UK, Badenoch said:

I can say, hand on heart, that I share the frustrations of the British public, and in many cases, their anger. We need to fix this. The system is broken. We can’t just ignore it and pretend that the problem will solve itself.

And what I am worried about is that Labour will assume that, because they’ve won, people like their immigration policy.

Because people voted Refom, we have now got a Labour government.

However, I think that there is a dissonance between what people want, which is lower and better migration, and what Labour is offering. You look at what they have done since they came in, they haven’t set out anything meaningful on immigration – a few slogans here and there about smashing the gangs, I think they had a press conference when they arrested one person, for example. This is not serious.

Badenoch is certainly right to say that the rise of Reform UK at the election contributed to the scale of Labour’s victory. But that does not necessarily mean that, if Reform UK did not exist, the Tories would have won.

Here is the full quote from Kemi Badenoch’s answer to Steven Swinford from the Times, who asked if Badenoch still thought that leaving the European convention on human rights (ECHR) would not be an easy answer to the immigration issue. (See 4.02pm.) She replied:

I’ve always said that leaving the ECHR is not the silver bullet. It’s not even the most radical thing that we probably will have to do.

But if we’re going to leave the ECHR, we need to have a plan, not just a promise.

There is a lot more that is going on in our immigration system beyond the ECHR, and what I don’t want to do is what has happened before, where politicians make promises quickly to get votes, and then things aren’t delivered.

What you are going to see from us is a new approach – principles and policy based on a plan.

Philp says he thinks the Rwanda model, which involved deporting all arrivals, is better than offshore processing, which involves taking people to another country to have their asylum claim processed, but successful applicants being admitted.

Badenoch says the culture of the Home Office is important. It is not a charity. It should recruit people who are serious about reducing migration, she says.

And that’s the end of the Q&A.

Q: [From Nick Gutteridge from the Telegraph] The French government has today said it would not arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if he came to France. What do you think of the government’s failure to say what it would do if Netanyahu came to the UK?

Badenoch says she thinks that is wrong, but today she wants to talk about immigration.

Q: [From Tamara Cohen from Sky News] Previous Tory leaders set a cap on migration. Why would your policy be different?

Badenoch says past leaders just set an number. She would have a proper plan for reaching the number given, she says.

Chris Philp says, with free movement, the government did not have full control when Britain was in the EU.

He also says Britain needs an effective deterrent.

Q: [From Steven Swinford from the Times] Do you still see leaving the ECHR as an easy answer?

Badenoch says leaving the ECHR is “not even the most radical thing that we probably will have to do”. She says immigration policy does not just all revolve around leaving the ECHR.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

I’ve always said that leaving the ECHR is not the silver bullet. It’s not even the most radical thing that we probably will have to do.

But if we’re going to leave the ECHR, we need to have a plan, not just a promise.

There is a lot more that is going on in our immigration system beyond the ECHR, and what I don’t want to do is what has happened before, where politicians make promises quickly to get votes, and then things aren’t delivered.

What you are going to see from us is a new approach – principles and policy based on a plan.

Q: [From Christopher Hope from GB News] Why should people trust you when your party completely “cocked things up” And will the cap be below 100,000?

Badenoch says to win back trust, you have to admit you got things wrong. She says she has done that.

Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, gave a short speech. And now Kemi Badenoch is taking questions.

Q: Are you still committed to reintroducing the Rwanda scheme?

Badenoch says the Tories still think a deterrent is needed.

She claims other people think the same. Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, has said she is in favour of offshore processing, she says.

Q: Would you support a possible blasphemy law?

Badenoch says she is against a blasphemy law.

Badenoch ended her speech saying her party made mistakes on immigration.

We can argue about the effects of migration on the economy, we can discuss the impact on public services and housing, and we haven’t done that enough. But fundamentally, this country is not a dormitory or a hotel. It is our home. We need to look after it.

I want to rebuild the trust between the Conservative party and the British people.

I know we have a lot of work to do, but the first step is to accept that mistakes were made and to learn from them. As the new party leader, I want to acknowledge that we made mistakes.

Badenoch says the immigration system is broken. But her party will review all aspects of policy, she says.

We will review every policy treaty and part of our legal framework, including the ECHR and the Human Rights Act, and in designing our detailed policies, we will put the following elements at the core:

-a strict numerical cap, with visas only for those who will make a substantial and clear overall contribution;

-a fully transparent approach publishing all the data, so that for the first time, everyone can see the real costs and benefits of different types of migration;

-a reconsidered approach to citizenship and settlement, making the path to a British passport a privilege to be earned, not an automatic right;

-zero tolerance for foreign criminals remaining in the UK;

-and, of course, an effective deterrent for illegal migration.

Overall, our plans will look at all immigration routes, family, study, asylum and work, and at all ways people can enter the UK.

We will look at the access of migrants and any dependents to welfare and public services, and we will need to improve the data and economic modeling that decision makers rely on.