Keir Starmer: I regret 'island of strangers' speech

Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said he "deeply regrets" saying that immigration risked making the UK "an island of strangers".

In a speech on a tightening of immigration policy, the Labour leader used wording close to that used by Enoch Powell in his inflammatory 1968 'rivers of blood' speech.

In a new interview, he said he had not read the speech thoroughly in advance and did not recognise the phrase as being similar to the language used by Powell.

Speaking to The Observer, he said he had been shaken before the speech by an arson attack on his family home in London.

Starmer said he was "really, really worried" and almost declined to go ahead with the pre-planned press conference.

He said: "I wouldn’t have used those words if I had known they were, or even would be interpreted as an echo of Powell.

"I had no idea – and my speechwriters didn’t know either. But that particular phrase, no, it wasn’t right.

"I'll give you the honest truth: I deeply regret using it."

Starmer has been accused by critics on the left of pandering to Reform UK with its stance on immigration.

However, Starmer said his party had become "too distant from working-class people" on the issue and had to address it.

The remarks follow a major U-turn by the prime minister on government welfare reforms.

A clutch of Scottish MPs were amongst around 100 Labour politicians poised to rebel over changes to benefits for disabled people.

The government said the changes were necessary to reduce public spending and encourage more people into work.

However, critics called them cruel and said they would not deliver the intended results.

Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall has now told Labour MPs that the planned cuts to the Personal Independence Payment (Pip) and the health element of Universal Credit will now only apply to future claimants, with current recipients spared.

Care minister Stephen Kinnock said "the right balance" had been struck and the government is confident the reforms will now pass in a vote on Tuesday.

The climbdown marks the third of its kind in a month by the prime minister and follows the reversal of cuts to Winter Fuel Payments for older people and the order of a grooming gangs enquiry after weeks of refusals.

Shirley-Anne Somerville, Scotland's social security secretary, said her government "will not follow Labour's lead" on welfare changes.

She said: "A two-tier system cannot be a fair system. That's what disabled people would have told the Labour government if they had actually asked them rather than making a backroom late night deal with their own MPs."