Nigel Farage, who leads Reform UK, is expected on Monday to put forward a proposal that would halt new asylum applications for the duration of a full parliamentary term and render any cases currently under consideration null and void. Under the proposed changes, asylum tribunals would be wound down alongside the formal pathways through which refugees gain legal entry and resettlement support.
Projections put forward under a Reform Party administration suggest that around 90,000 pending appeals — covering both asylum and humanitarian protection cases — could go unheard, with those claimants facing removal from the country instead. Under Reform UK's stated plans, the resettlement schemes that Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has indicated would be reopened would instead be shut down, with official estimates placing roughly a quarter of those who would have been admitted as Palestinians and Afghan women and girls.
The party contends that no popular mandate exists for those programmes, and has stated that any individuals who arrived through them would face deportation. Under the proposals, those who received asylum protection at any point during the preceding five years would face a reassessment of their cases by the Home Office.
Speaking to a broadcaster, Farage put forward the position that the country was confronting a national security emergency and that protecting citizens stood as the primary obligation of any government. Proponents of stricter border controls have argued that admitting additional asylum seekers is untenable while the total number of undocumented residents and any associated public-safety considerations remain unquantified.
The party's platform, as outlined in its pledges, commits a Reform-led administration to prioritising the interests of people residing in Britain and maintaining border controls, while also proposing that trade tariffs be deployed as leverage to compel other nations to accept the return of deported individuals. Reform UK put forward a proposal earlier in the year to halt visa applications from nationals of certain countries — among them Pakistan, Afghanistan and Syria — in cases where those governments chose not to take back individuals subject to deportation orders.
Under the party's proposals, nationals of Eritrea, Sudan, and Somalia — along with those from the other named countries — would face a halt to new visa approvals, given the volume of visas those nations currently receive from the UK, while trading partners less affected by such a visa freeze could face a separate set of measures, including tariffs and airline bans, aimed at increasing compliance pressure.
Labour Party chairwoman Bridget Phillipson argued that Nigel Farage had put forward a policy identical to one already held by Restore, doing so at a time when his party was contending with reported scandals, active police investigations, and an internal challenge from that rival grouping. On one side of the debate, a Labour politician argued that turning away those escaping conflict and persecution would undermine values held in common; on the other, Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp maintained that the package being put forward bore a close resemblance to ground his own party had already covered — citing prohibitions on asylum applications lodged after unauthorised entry, the removal of immigration tribunal oversight, and the shutting down of resettlement routes as measures the Conservatives had previously advanced.
According to the published BORDERS document, the party's platform calls for withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights and a target of removing unauthorised arrivals within seven days, while the document also takes aim at what it identifies as weaknesses in modern slavery claims and judicial review procedures — areas the accompanying statement noted were not addressed in Reform's proposals.
