Nigel Farage has vowed to stop small boat crossing within two weeks if he becomes Prime Minister. The Reform UK leader also warned the country is “in a very bad place” while insisting his party is “the last chance” to get it back on track.
Speaking to 6,000 people in Birmingham on Friday, Mr Farage said: “Our country is in a very bad place. It’s a mixture between anger and despair.” He said there was “societal breakdown” and “cultural decline”.
“I get this in the street from people, people point at me and say, ‘You are the last chance we’ve got to get this country back on track’. We are the last chance the country has got to get this country back on track.”
Mr Farage said he was going to have lunch with the Albanian premier to talk about deporting foreign criminals after announcing a Reform UK government would stop the boats within two weeks. He added “We will deport foreign criminals.
“I’m off to have lunch in a few weeks with the prime minister of Albania. I might book a very big plane and take a load with me, I’m not sure yet.
“We will stop what is a threat to our national security, what is a danger to girls and women on our streets.
“We will stop the boats and we will detain and deport those who illegally break into our country, doing what nearly every normal country around the rest of the world does.
“You cannot come here illegally and stay – we will stop the boats within two weeks of winning government.”
Zia Yusuf will be Reform UK’s new head of policy and the party will set up a department for preparing for government, Mr Farage has announced.
He said: “In order to get all these policies brought together under one roof – and it’s a massive workload – I’m going to ask Zia Yusuf, from this day, to be our head of policy to bring all of this together.
“I will, in the next few weeks, open up a new department within the party, leaning on the experience that Nadine (Dorries) and others have – and others will come.
“Others with experience will come. Don’t worry about that, and we will open a department for preparing for government so that when we win, we can hit the ground running.”
Mr Farage warned of a “big rift” in Labour and told Reform UK’s national party conference that he thinks a general election could take place in 2027.
His comments followed Angela Rayner’s resignation from government over failing to pay £40,000 in tax on her second home in Hove.
The scandal over the former housing secretary underpaying £40,000 of stamp duty “screams to entitlement”, Mr Farage said.
Brexit’s architect declared that the Government was “deep in crisis” as Sir Keir scrambled to reshuffle his top team.
The Reform UK leader also laid into the “cabinet of people wholly unqualified to run our country”.
Speaking without an Autocue or script, he joked about the CV blunders of Chancellor Rachel Reeves and Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds, before saying the UK was lucky until half an hour ago to have a housing secretary who was a “property developer and speculator”.
Meanwhile Reform UK may need to rethink its pledge to deliver £90bn of tax cuts, the party’s deputy leader Richard Tice suggested.
The Reform UK manifesto published ahead of last year’s general election made commitments to slash income tax in particular, as well as large spending pledges on defence.
But Mr Tice told the BBC: “A manifesto in July 2024 is not appropriate for a manifesto or contract whenever the next general election is.”