News | Politics I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice . Refugees are being scapegoated for the Government ’s failures on immigration , Angela Rayner told a packed meeting on Monday.
Speaking at an event hosted by the grassroots campaign network Citizens UK, Labour ’s deputy leader also said that parts of the general election have been “nasty” and admitted that if Labour forms the next Government, it “won’t always be easy”. With just days until the election, Ms Rayner fielded questions from Citizens UK representatives on wages, housing, migration and devolution at Westminster’s Methodist Central Hall. She told the event that under the current Government, refugees are being “scapegoated, while those in power fail to take responsibility for our crumbling immigration system”.
Labour have repeatedly highlighted the fact that more than 50,000 people have crossed the English Channel in small boats since Rishi Sunak became Prime Minister, and say the Tories have created a “perma-backlog” by failing to process their asylum claims in a timely fashion. The Conservatives have likewise accused Labour of failing to properly explain how they will “stop the boats” and claim that Sir Keir Starmer’s party would remove a vital “deterrent” for illegal migrants by scrapping the Tory plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda. On immigration more broadly, the Tories have said that voters “should not .
