Nigel Farage attacks opponents for wanting to 'let everyone come' to Britain

Cabinet Minister Penny Mordaunt warned a Labour government would lead to uncontrolled migration in a fiery clash with Angela Rayner.

In brutal exchanges during a seven-way televised election debate, the Commons leader attacked Ms Rayner for being clueless on the issue.

Labour’s deputy leader insisted strains on the public sector are down to the government rather that high levels of migration.

But Ms Mordaunt shot back that Labour has “no target, they have no clue,” and would allow “uncontrolled immigration”.

She told Ms Rayner: “Your leader campaigned for free movement.”

“Keir Starmer has spent most of his life campaigning for free movement. These guys are not going to control immigration.”

Ms Mordaunt said immigration is too high and the Tories will introduce a cap set by parliament.

She said: “The best way to do this is to get Parliament – your parliament, elected by you – to have an annual cap. What that will do is take into account the economic needs, the needs of the workforce, but also the pressures that immigration puts on communities.”

Ms Rayner said Labour would scrap the Rwanda scheme.

“We would put that money into a Border Force Command which would be able to smash the gangs because we need to do that.

“And 14 years of the Conservatives, they’re relying on overseas to fill our skills shortages because we haven’t got an industrial and skills strategy.”

Reform leader Nigel Farage said the country was facing a population crisis following changes introduced by Sir Tony Blair that have led to record numbers.

Welsh nationalist Rhun ap Iorwerth, leader of Plaid Cymru, said the immigration debate was too often “framed around the bigotry of people like Nigel Farage”.

Mr Farage threw his hands up in despair and replied: “Open doors, everyone come, benefits for everybody, lovely.”

The Clacton candidate said he wanted to inject some “logic” into the discussion.

He said “most of those that come in are actually dependents”, adding: “This ought to be the immigration election, because whether we talk about housing, whether we talk about the fact that rents are up between 20 and 30% in most of the country in the last four years, whether we talk about the roads, whether we talk about infrastructure, we are living through a population crisis.”

The ill-tempered debate, hosted by the BBC’s Mishal Husain, erupted again over the cost of living crisis.

Ms Mordaunt warned that Labour would land hard-pressed households with a tax bill of £2,000 if elected.

Conservative analysis based largely on Treasury figures of Labour spending has found a £38.5 billion blackhole in the party’s spending plans. Labour disputes the claims.

Ms Mordaunt told the audience: “We have got to cut taxes and we have got to alleviate the burdens on business.

“Angela Rayner’s party – Keir Starmer confirmed this earlier this week – they are going to put up your taxes by £2,000 per working household.”

Ms Rayner said: “That is a lie”, and added that the Government had raised taxes to a “record level”.

She added: “We will not promise anything we cannot fund.”

Labour’s GB Energy policy will result in “giant bills”, Ms Mordaunt added.

“It’s not just your taxes that I’m worried about, I’m worried about my constituents being able to afford a Labour government,” she said.

“Angela mentioned GB Energy, do you know what the GB stands for? It stands for giant bills, and more bills are coming with the net zero plans that Labour have.”

Mr Farage said the general election campaigns of the two main parties had been “one of the worst” he has ever seen.

Ms Rayner smirked as the Reform leader said Sir Keir is “very dull” and described him as “Blair without the flair”.

He added: “The real leader of the Labour party is here tonight on the stage. At least she’s got some personality.”

He described the PM as “slippery Sunak” and said the two main parties “don’t really disagree on anything”.

Mr Farage said there was a decline in law and order because police and politicians are “too scared” to address the issue.

“You can go shoplifting now, any of you,” he said. “We know the areas in which knives are most prevalent – stop and search.

“And of course, we don’t do it – ‘oh gosh, if this area has got a high proportion of people from the black and ethnic minority communities, they might call us racist’ – we’ve got to stop doing this.

“We’ve got to completely forget the colour of people’s skins, treat everybody equally, but we must do stop and search.”

Mr Farage added: “You can go out and nick up to 200 quid’s-worth without being prosecuted. We are seeing a decline, a societal decline of law and order in this country and frankly Government and the police forces are being too scared of what needs to be done.”

Daisy Cooper, deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, launched an attack on the Conservatives for breaking the public’s “hope”.

But she was challenged by Hussain, who said: “Do you remember going back on the tuition fees pledge?” as Mr Farage laughed.

Ms Cooper replied: “That’s a sore subject for us, for sure, that was a very difficult decision”.