‘Tories have betrayed Britain on mass immigration’, says Tice

Reform UK leader Richard Tice tells Cathy Newman his net-zero migration policy will improve the NHS and economic growth.

RIchard Tice: What we can see from the Tory reaction today is they are terrified. They know that they’ve broken Britain. They know that they’ve betrayed everybody, with the mass migration numbers that came out this morning, absolute betrayal.

A city the size of Birmingham arrived in 2023, putting huge pressure on housing. Young people are the ones who are suffering the most. Can’t afford the 20% increase in rents in the last two years. Health care, we’re getting slower health care, more health delays, ambulance delays, A&E delays, greater waiting lists. The greatest ever. Why? Because of the huge extra pressure. Because the Tories have betrayed Britain on mass immigration.

Cathy Newman: The waiting list could be just as much to do with the fact we’ve got an ageing population and a sicker population. Migrants tend to be pretty young.

Richard Tice: It’s all to do with the extra surge in demand

Cathy Newman: What, the NHS waiting list?

Richard Tice: All of it.

Cathy Newman: A lot of migrants are young. They’re not putting particular pressure on…

Richard Tice: Are you saying that none of the 2.5 million people who have arrived here in the last two years, none of them using the NHS. That’s ridiculous, Cathy. It’s a serious contributor.

Cathy Newman: I’m querying your evidence for that.

Richard Tice: The evidence of that is that the waiting lists, all elements of healthcare, is a disaster, and therefore the outcomes are worse. Our excess deaths are worse. And here’s the other point. The evidence is we’ve got the longest per person recession since records began 70 years ago.

Cathy Newman: And you really think that net zero immigration, which is your policy, would help the economy?

Richard Tice: Absolutely, because guess what it does? It drives up demand for labour, which means the price of labour of the least well off, the lowest paid, goes up. That’s a good thing. It also drives capital investment because if businesses can’t afford labour, guess what they do? They invest in capital equipment. It’s basic economics.

That’s the reason why. Hear me out. That’s the reason why our economies grew 2.5%-3.5% in the 1980s and 1990s, before mass immigration. Since Labour and then the Tories imposed mass immigration, guess what? Real wage growth has declined and plummeted. They are directly linked. And I’m the only person who’s calling it out.