Alan Royston

Left: Five times on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, Nigel Farage claimed the UK couldn’t control EU immigration under freedom of movement and had an 'open door policy' - that’s a lie. Right: In 2017, Femi got him to admit on LBC that EU rules allowed restrictions. “Femi, in theory, you’re right.” My view: There was no “open doors” policy with the EU. Freedom of movement was and still is managed migration. Freedom of movement meant British citizens could live and work in any of the other 27 EU countries, and their citizens could do the same here. After three months, an EU citizen could stay in the UK if they were working or self-employed. Students and people living on their own funds could also stay if they had enough money to support themselves and comprehensive health cover. That’s Article 7 of EU Directive 2004/38/EC. Article 14(4)(b) also protected jobseekers who could show they were still looking for work and had a genuine chance of finding it. Article 8 allowed the UK to require EU citizens staying longer than three months to register. The UK chose not to apply these rules. Just as it was the UK government’s choice to impose austerity and cut public services, causing real frustration and making life more difficult for people. At the end of the video, Femi warns that ending freedom of movement could lead to more immigration. And that’s exactly what happened. Under the UK’s post-Brexit rules, put in place by lead Brexiter Boris Johnson, net migration rose to 944,000 in the year to March 2023. Five times Laura Kuenssberg could have corrected Nigel Farage on his remarks, five times she ignored it. It's this type of dishonesty from journalists who drive narratives instead of providing objective analysis.

Paul Nowak, "The national minimum wage is £12.71 an hour" "Nobody on this panel is on £12.71 an hour" "And I think it is right that we are looking to increase people's wages" "Why? When low paid members get a pay rise, what do they do, they go out and spend it in local shops and local restaurants" "They don't squirrel it away in offshore bank accounts" My view: For someone earning the least, a pay rise can mean putting the heating on without worrying, buying fresh food, or getting through the month without borrowing. That matters in its own right. People deserve more than a lifetime of work spent barely scraping by. There is an economic value too. When household budgets have been stretched to breaking point, extra income helps meet needs that have gone unmet. That spending supports other people’s jobs and gives local businesses customers who can afford to walk through the door. We spend so much time asking whether the economy can afford to pay people more. We should also ask what it costs us to keep so many people poor.