Khan joins calls for Mahmood to water down immigration reforms

Lord Khan of Tooting has urged Shabana Mahmood to show “compassion” as he joins calls for the Home Secretary to water down her immigration reforms. The Labour Mayor of London said Ms Mahmood’s proposal to extend the time foreign nationals must wait before being granted indefinite leave to remain (ILR) was unfair on those already living in Britain. Ms Mahmood plans to increase this period from five to 15 years, prompting a backlash from Cabinet ministers and trade unions about the measure’s effect on social care workers. Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Lord Khan said he had raised his opposition to the ILR reforms during the Government’s consultation earlier this year. He said: “I think Shabana Mahmood is absolutely right to have these conversations out in the open. She’s right to be expressing her views and to have a consultation. “I’ve responded to the consultation in relation to the opportunities, but also the concerns I have. I’m somebody who’s not in favour of changing rules retrospectively, but also I’m somebody who recognises we need to control our borders.” ‘We need compassion as well’ Lord Khan added: “We need to make sure those who come here contribute. But also in our immigration policy, we need compassion as well. And I’m confident once Shabana Mahmood has taken on board the responses to the consultation, she’ll announce a policy that we can all get behind.” Asked why he was confident Ms Mahmood would deliver a policy he would support despite his current opposition, he said she was someone he had known for “many years [and] somebody who does listen”. On Monday, Andy Burnham said that while he supported the “principle” of Ms Mahmood’s reforms, he refused to back increasing the eligibility period to 15 years. In an interview with Good Morning Britain on Monday, the Prime Minister refused to say he supported Ms Mahmood’s proposals as they were currently laid out. Asked whether he agreed with the decision to extend the wait for ILR to 15 years, including for migrants already living in Britain, he said: “Well, we’ll set out the plan on that quite soon. But can I just make the point why has this problem arisen? “It’s arisen because if you look back to the early 2020s, people call it the Boriswave, a huge number of people came in seeking permanent settlement on longer-term visas. “And that is the change I was pointing to. The Home Secretary is right, in my view, to bring forward changes that are based on the principle that settlement is a right to be earned, not just granted automatically, and she’ll set out the final conclusions soon.” After Boris Johnson relaxed the UK’s visa rules, 4.2 million migrants came to the UK between 2021 and 2024, peaking at 944,000 in the year to March 2023. Angela Rayner was the first Cabinet minister to attack the proposals in an interview before the Labour Party conference . The Housing Secretary said the retrospective application of the reforms would “change the goalposts” for migrants , particularly foreign care workers who had “moved their lives here to look after our loved ones”. Last week, Miatta Fahnbulleh, the Energy Secretary, refused 16 times to back Ms Mahmood’s reform . The Telegraph revealed that she had criticised the policy on her constituency website, claiming it threatened “the process of building cohesion”. There is mounting speculation that Ms Mahmood will soften the proposals to stave off a rebellion. Speaking at the party’s conference in Liverpool, she indicated that she would announce a compromise that would be “fair” to tens of thousands of migrants already in the UK. Mr Burnham is believed to favour some form of carve-out for care workers as part of his plans to develop a social care system for the elderly that is free at the point of use. Asked a second time whether he specifically supported the extension of eligibility for ILR to 15 years, Mr Burnham would only say he supported the “principle” of Ms Mahmood’s proposals. He added: “There was a consultation and we have to listen to what came forward as a result of that consultation.” Chris Philp , the shadow home secretary, has called on Ms Mahmood to resign if she is unable to pass her reforms to ILR through Parliament. In a letter to his counterpart, he promised the Conservatives would back her plans if she did not water them down.