SEC

The Home Secretary has vowed to do whatever it takes to secure the UK’s borders as she unveils a Farage-style crackdown on migrants.

The government will slap tough new conditions on migrants requiring them to prove they are valuable to society or face the boot, Shabana Mahmood MP said during a speech at Labour conference on Monday.

4

4

The plans are Labour’s latest attempt to wrestle ownership of the immigration issue off Reform, which has led the debate and gained huge popularity.

In order to earn indefinite leave to remain (ILR), migrants will have to learn to speak a “high standard” of English, Mahmood said on Monday.

Most migrants can currently apply for ILR after five years of living in Britain – handing them the right to live here forever.

But that may soon double to ten years and be limited to those who pay National Insurance, Mahmood revealed in her first Labour Party conference speech.

Migrants will also be required to have a clean criminal record, not claimed benefits and prove a record of volunteering in local communities.

The Home Secretary promised to “do whatever it takes to secure our borders”.

She said: “Time spent in this country alone is not enough. You must earn the right to live in this country.”

Meanwhile, Mahmood slammed Mr Farage as “worse than racist… it’s immoral”.

Officials say the new “earn it” system will allow migrants to “earn down” the ten-year wait through positive contributions – or “earn up” if they fail to pull their weight.

But the crackdown does not apply retrospectively, meaning the so-called “Boriswave” of approximately 1.3million who arrived between 2021 and 2024 can still qualify for ILR after just five years.

It is understood Ms Mahmood is weighing a separate emergency fix just for them, though it may not be the same model.

One source close to the Home Secretary said: “For anybody who is in the country now, the new conditions don’t apply.

“But she is looking closely at what to do about the Boris wave, because she is concerned about what happens when that group passes beyond the five-year mark and automatically receives ILR.”

Lawyers have warned any retrospective move would spark fierce legal challenges.

4

4

Ashley Stothard, Immigration Lawyer at Freeths, said on applying the ten-year rule retrospectively: “I think that change would be challenged by judicial review on the basis that it’s unfair.

“We saw a similar situation back in 2008 when the Government attempted to retrospectively change the criteria for the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme.

“That challenge was successful, and the new criteria were not applied to those already in the UK.

“The case upheld the principle that immigration policy should be fair and transparent. Migrants in the UK have a legitimate expectation that they can qualify for Indefinite Leave to Remain under the rules in place when they entered.”

Ms Mahmood yesterday warned Labour members they might not like her migrant crackdown.

She said: “In solving this crisis, you may not always like what I do. We will have to question some of the assumptions and legal constraints that have lasted for a generation and more.

“But unless we have control of our borders and until we can decide who comes in and who must leave, we will never be the open, tolerant and generous country that I know we all believe in.”

Nigel Farage’s anti-immigration Reform UK, which is leading in opinion polls, said last week it was considering scrapping “indefinite leave to remain”, and replacing it with a five-year renewable work visa.

Starmer accused Reform on Sunday of planning a “racist policy” of mass deportations, although he clarified he did not think Reform supporters were racist.

The report comes as the White House pushes to fire fed governor Lisa Cook for a similar reason.

United States Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent agreed to occupy two different houses at the same time as his “principal residence”, an agreement similar to the one US President Donald Trump has called mortgage fraud in his effort to fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook.

The story, first reported by the Bloomberg news service on Wednesday, cites Bessent’s mortgages with lender Bank of America and his pledge in 2007 to primarily occupy homes in New York and Massachusetts.

Mortgage experts told Bloomberg there was no sign of wrongdoing or proof of fraud in Bessent’s home-loan filings and said the issue highlights incongruities found in such documents.

Bank of America did not rely on Bessent’s pledges and never expected him to occupy both homes as his primary residences, Bloomberg reported, citing the mortgage documents.

Representatives for Bessent did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Republican president, who appointed Bessent to the Treasury post, and members of his administration have accused Cook, an appointee of Democratic former President Joe Biden, of committing mortgage fraud, a claim Cook denies.

The White House did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.

Comparable to Cook

Congress included provisions in the 1913 law that created the Fed to shield the central bank from political interference. Under that law, Fed governors may be removed by a president only “for cause”, though the law does not define the term nor establish procedures for removal. No president has ever removed a Fed governor, and the law has never been tested in court.

Trump has sought to remove Cook for cause, citing the alleged fraud. A US appeals court on Monday declined to allow Trump to fire her. The White House has said it will appeal the decision to the US Supreme Court.

Trump’s Department of Justice also has launched a criminal mortgage fraud probe into Cook, issuing grand jury subpoenas in Georgia and Michigan, the news agency Reuters previously reported.

A loan estimate for an Atlanta home bought by Cook showed that she had declared the property as a “vacation home”, according to a document reviewed by Reuters. The property tax authority in Ann Arbor, Michigan, also said Cook had not broken rules for tax breaks on a home there that had been declared her primary residence.

Bloomberg, in its report on Wednesday, pointed to similar but not identical pledges made by a lawyer on Bessent’s behalf on September 20, 2007, agreeing to make a Bedford Hills, New York, house his “principal residence” over the next year, as well as another house in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

“There are people who think that President Trump is putting undue pressure on the Fed. And there are people like President Trump and myself who think that if a Fed official committed mortgage fraud, that this should be examined, and that they shouldn’t be serving as one of the nation’s leading financial regulators,” Bessent told Fox Business Network in an August 27 interview.

Bessent is not the only one. Close relatives of Bill Pulte – who was appointed by Trump as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency and is the official who has accused Cook of mortgage fraud – have declared the same status on two homes in two different states, public records show.

Mark and Julie Pulte, the father and stepmother have claimed so-called “homestead exemptions” for residences in wealthy neighbourhoods in both Michigan and Florida, Reuters reported earlier, citing public records.

The exemption is meant to give a discount to homeowners on taxes for properties they use as their primary residence.

Sept. 15 (UPI) — Secretary of State Marco Rubio reaffirmed the United States’ relationships with Israel and Arab states during a meeting Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem.

The meeting comes less than a week after Israel said it targeted Hamas leaders in an airstrike on Qatar’s capital, Doha. Hamas confirmed the attack killed five members but not any senior officials.

Speaking at a news conference the meeting with Netanyahu, Rubio said every country was allowed “to defend itself beyond its borders.”

Asked whether the United States was involved in the planning of the strikes on Doha, Netanyahu told reporters, “We did it on our own. Period.” He said the relationship between Israel and the United States was as “durable as the stones in the Western Wall.”

The two leaders visited the holy site in Jerusalem’s Old City, with Rubio placing a note into the cracks of the wall.

“Your presence here today sends a clear message that America stands with Israel,” Netanyahu told Rubio.

Rubio, meanwhile, also told reporters that the United States maintains a strong relationship with Qatar and other Arab allies, who were meeting in an emergency session in Doha on Monday.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim al-Thani called on international leaders to punish Israel for the strike and stop holding the country to “double standards,” according to BBC News.

An unnamed source familiar with the meeting told CBS News that leaders at the meeting were expected to sign a draft resolution condemning Israel’s “hostile acts, including genocide, ethnic cleansing, [and] starvation” in Gaza.

A State Department official told CBS News that after Monday’s meeting with Netanyahu in Jerusalem, Rubio plans to travel to Qatar before heading to Britain for President Donald Trump‘s state visit.