Nigel Farage shifts on immigration, touts Trump ties and bold tax cuts in bid for UK power

Key topics:.Farage softens anti-immigration stance, emphasizes "pro-control" policy.Reform Party aims for power with tax cuts and spending reforms by 2029.Farage offers to aid UK-Labour ties with Trump, eyes US-UK trade deals..Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here..The seventh BizNews Conference, BNC#7, is to be held in Hermanus from March 11 to 13, 2025. The 2025 BizNews Conference is designed to provide an excellent opportunity for members of the BizNews community to interact directly with the keynote speakers, old (and new) friends from previous BNC events – and to interact with members of the BizNews team. Register for BNC#7 here..If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..By Lucy White, Caroline Hepker and William Shaw.Nigel Farage said Reform UK isn't anti-immigration and advocated a mixture of tax and spending cuts as he sought to put a more moderate face on his insurgent party in a bid to take it from the political fringes to challenge for power. .In a half-hour interview with Bloomberg's UK Politics Podcast, Farage, who in July won a Parliamentary seat at the eighth time of asking, accepted his party's economic plans came with a "big initial cost," denied they'd wreak the same sort of market havoc as the seven-week prime minister Liz Truss's ill-fated mini budget of 2022, and advocated for sectoral trade deals with the US. .He also repeated his offer to help Prime Minister Keir Starmer's Labour government in its relations with the incoming US administration of Donald Trump, a personal friend, and labeled Tesla owner Elon Musk — who recently called for Farage's ouster as Reform leader — a "hero" for buying the social media platform Twitter, now X, and promoting free speech. .But for a UK audience familiar with the Brexit architect's long history of campaigning against European Union membership and the free movement of people that went with it, Farage's remarks on immigration appear to represent a softening. He denied Reform was anti-immigration, saying instead it was "pro-control."."We are not putting up the barriers entirely," Farage, 60, said. "If we want the City of London, where we're sitting right now, if we want our tech sector to be a world leader, if we want to turn this place into one of the crypto trading centers of the world — all those things — there's a lot we can do with British people, but we will need some highly-skilled people from other parts of the world.".Read more: BN Briefing: Zimbabwe coalition warnings; SA airline controversy; US banks profit.The remarks contrast with Farage's campaigning during Britain's referendum on leaving the European Union in 2016. Then, he drew criticism for suggesting continued EU membership would allow 75 million Turkish citizens to travel freely to Britain, and was accused of stoking anti-immigrant hostility with a poster showing a queue of largely non-white migrants under the slogan: "Breaking point." Farage once again made immigration a focal point in last year's vote, calling it an "immigration election," tying economic and social problems to an influx of people from abroad. .Farage stressed Reform was "non sectarian, non racist" and would never have dealings with far-right campaigner Tommy Robinson — whose release from prison Musk has repeatedly called for this year..UK policy needs to ensure there's no "overall population explosion due to immigration," Farage said, referring to official data showing net migration soared to an all-time high of 906,000 in the year to June 2023. Nevertheless, he said "there's still plenty of room for people to come on either work visas or in some cases come to settle." He failed to address how lower migration would affect the health and social care sectors, which are currently staffed by large numbers of low-paid workers from overseas. .Riding high in recent opinion polls that put Reform roughly level-pegging with both Labour and the Conservatives, Farage smells an opportunity to finally make a dent in the duopoly that have dominated British politics for a century — in his words, the "uni-party." After making inroads into the Tory vote in the general election in July, he's said he's now coming for Labour, promising a political revolution..Britain's first-past-the-post electoral system doesn't help. Reform won just 5 seats on 14.3% of the vote, compared with the 72 seats taken by the centrist Liberal Democrats on 12.2%, a reflection of that party's more seasoned ground operation. With Reform placing second in 98 constituencies, Farage has vowed to professionalize his still new party and make it a force by the next election, due by mid-2029..While Farage's elevation to Parliament gives him a platform to build on the 2024 vote, he's also helped by his relationship with Trump, an old friend who singled him out at a rally in the final days of the presidential campaign. Farage said he knows half the president-elect's cabinet, reiterating an offer to act as a go-between with the UK government.."If they need help with the relationship, particularly in terms of negotiating tariffs or maybe sectoral free trade agreements, which I do believe are possible with the Trump regime, I of course would help because that is in the national interest," he said. He added that Trump would likely be amenable to strike deals on products such as whisky, motorbikes and financial services, but that one on agriculture might be too hard. .Farage declined to say if he'd spoken to Labour grandee Peter Mandelson — who advised the government to swallow its pride and make use of Farage in its dealings with Trump — since he was named ambassador to Washington. He called the veteran politician "bright, clever, wily," but said Trump worked better with entrepreneurs and that the UK "could do better." He also warned that Starmer's pursuit of deeper EU ties could alienate the UK from Trump's administration..And while there was some praise for Musk — a key adviser to Trump — for promoting free speech on X, he also warned it was important for the billionaire not to be seen to be dictating policy to the US Treasury Department..Domestically, Reform's election performance was built on its so-called "contract" with voters, in which the party vowed to boost growth by slashing taxes, migration and "wasteful" government spending. .Headline policies included saving £50 billion ($61 billion) a year through cuts in bureaucracy and "wasteful" spending; raising the level at which workers should start paying income tax to £20,000 from £12,570, and ending interest payments made by the Bank of England to commercial banks on reserves created through quantitative easing, which it said would save £35 billion a year..Read more: FlySafair's claim all SA airlines overbook like them is rubbish – Miles vd Molen.But Reform's manifesto was criticized by Tax Policy Associates' Dan Neidle and the Institute for Fiscal Studies for being vague and for making incorrect costing projections for certain policies. And with His Majesty's Revenue and Customs — the UK's tax collector — saying each £100 increase in the income tax threshold costs £1 billion, the tax promise alone could cost more than £70 billion a year..The contract "set out our vision broadly of where we want to go," Farage said. "We're now in a completely different place, and I fully accept that between now and the next election, we've got to be more specific.".Farage said he realized he wouldn't be able to make all his promised tax cuts at once — a nod to the market turmoil triggered by Truss' unfunded package of tax cuts in 2022 that ultimately sank her government..Nigel Farage in London, on Jan. 16. Photographer: Jose Sarmento Matos/Bloomberg."We're being much more cautious than Liz Truss," Farage said, pointing to his plans to curb public spending. "Liz Truss was going for Big Bang, right? Everything at once and clearly way too much at once without corresponding initial spending cuts.".The Reform leader also emphasized his desire to push jobless Britons, and those who claim welfare benefits, back into work with a "carrot and stick" approach. Lower taxation would be the "carrot" to attract Britons currently stuck in a "welfare trap" into working more, Farage said. .The "stick" would include welfare cuts and curbs to rights such as working from home and four-day weeks, he said. "What I'm trying to do is give people a way out of poverty by making work pay.".Read also:.🔒 Elon Musk turns on Farage – urges party to appoint a new leader🔒 Nigel Farage: Political disruptor and this years most successful UK politician – Adrian Wooldridge🔒 RW Johnson – Labour's "landslide" – how Farage's poison pill slammed Tories.© 2025 Bloomberg L.P.

Nigel Farage shifts on immigration, touts Trump ties and bold tax cuts in bid for UK power

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