It is perhaps no accident that Rishi Sunak has rushed out his proposal for a cap on migrant workers and their dependants the day after Nigel Farage announced that he was taking over as leader of Reform UK. But you wonder how many votes there really are in a migration cap when Farage is already out there promising to reduce net migration to zero – a new interpretation of net zero, if you like. If you don’t like migration at all, Reform UK would seem to be your obvious choice. If, on the other hand, you are offended by illegal migration while accepting the argument that employers need the right to recruit some overseas workers, then the Tory policy announced today doesn’t seem quite right, either.
A better target for the Tories would be to focus on the kind of migration that really does upset people
The problem with a migration cap is how and when do you draw the line.
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