Prime Minister repeats misleading claim about Labour’s immigration plan

15 November 2023

At Prime Minister’s Questions just now, Rishi Sunak claimed Labour’s immigration plan involves “a cosy deal with the EU which would see the UK accept 100,000 illegal migrants”.

As we’ve previously explained, this figure is a Conservative party estimate which is not reliable.

The estimate makes a number of assumptions about a potential future returns deal with the EU, and appears to misinterpret a recent EU agreement on relocating some asylum seekers across the bloc.

In September Sir Keir Starmer said he would ultimately seek a returns deal with the EU if elected, but Labour has said it wouldn’t sign the UK up to an EU quota agreement. It hasn’t said what a future returns deal might look like, or how many migrants it would accept.

Shortly before today’s PMQs, the figure was also used by Conservative MP Jonathan Gullis, who said on BBC Politics Live that Labour’s plan to “stop the boats” was “a quota sharing scheme with the EU so we take 100,000 more illegal migrants”.

Last month we wrote to Mr Sunak and then-Conservative party chair Greg Hands about the use of the “100,000 migrants” figure, and asked them to take steps to prevent the claim being repeated by party members. We have not received a response.

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