Why we need to be more honest when it comes to the immigration debate - Matt Bromley

In a recent documentary marking a decade since Brexit, Nigel Farage was asked if he regretted his ‘Breaking Point’ poster which portrayed a long line of foreign-looking folk queuing up to enter Britain and promised leaving the EU would cut immigration.

He said he did not regret it and, what’s more, if he unveiled it today no one would care. “It's a very powerful image,” Farage told the BBC. “It's an image, by the way, that if you used it today, you'd probably get very little criticism."

Consider that for a moment. Is Farage suggesting we have become a less tolerant, more divided country since Brexit? A more factional land, its people more fearful of foreigners invading our shores? If so, for once, I think I agree with Farage. Get that printed on a tee-shirt!

This column is not an argument against discussing immigration honestly, nor against demanding competent border control. But it is a call for us to be more honest about what happens when public anger ceases to distinguish between an asylum seeker and a settled immigrant, between a recent arrival and someone who has lived here for decades or all their lives.

Most of us will never know what it is like to think twice before walking to the shops because of our ethnicity, our accent, or the colour of our skin. Political success is not measured solely in polling victories or council seats, but in whether people feel able to live ordinary lives in the places they call home.

What message does it send to ethnic minority communities when their councillors and politicians – the people elected to represent them – are associated with comments about immigrants, Muslims, and Black people that many would regard as deeply offensive? Remarks that would once have prompted widespread outrage now struggle to cut through the daily noise of political debate. Over the past decade, arguments about immigration, identity, and national culture have moved from the margins to the mainstream.

The consequence is that communities increasingly find themselves divided into ‘us’ and ‘them’. People who have lived in Britain for decades, whose children were born here and whose lives are rooted in their local neighbourhoods, are still too often spoken about as though they are outsiders. Their belonging is treated as conditional.

Yet politics – particularly at the local level where Reform now commands outright majorities in 24 councils and are the largest party in a further 10 – should be about improving people’s lives. Residents facing rising bills, struggling public services, and economic uncertainty need practical answers. They need investment, opportunity, and hope. What they don’t need is politics that encourages suspicion between neighbours.

Words matter because they shape attitudes. Attitudes, in turn, shape behaviour. When political debate is all about who belongs and who doesn’t, it becomes harder to build the trust on which healthy communities depend.

The question facing Britain is not simply who wins the next election or which party gains the next council seat. It is what kind of a country we want to be. A confident nation does not define itself by exclusion.

Matt Bromley is CEO of bee and chair of the Building Equity in Education campaign. He is the author of numerous books on education. Find out more at http://bee-online.uk