Starmer and Labour have been an unmitigated disaster on migration (Image: Getty)
Germany has given Britain a glimpse into the not-so-distant future in the form of an utterance from one disastrous leader, which will surely be repeated by another.
In 2015, former Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the door to more than 1 million refugees fleeing the Syrian civil war and in doing so sparked a migrant crisis from which Europe has never recovered.
Now, more than a decade later, she has told those who settled in Germany to vote against politicians who want to stop others from following in their footsteps.
She urged people with a “migration background” to join forces with those who do not align themselves with the country’s hard-Right party AfD and “stand together”.
It is a call that is certain to be reheated and repeated by Labour in a desperate and likely final bid to derail Nigel Farage and the apparently unstoppable march of Reform UK before the 2029 General Election.
Ms Merkel said: “Whether a German citizen has been a German citizen for two years or for four days, or the entire family for three generations, it doesn’t matter. We are the German people. We must also stick together when we have to take action against people who have completely different ideas about our future.”
It was not long ago that Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood sought to strike a hardline on illegal immigration, admitting it is “tearing our country apart”. It was an honest assessment and, naturally, did not go down well among Labour hand-wringers.
Ms Merkel is blamed for causing the European migrant crisis (Image: Getty)
It was also meaningless. Despite public anger reaching a boiling point, Labour has done nothing to address the migrant crisis.
In fact, it has made it worse.
Last year, around 41,472 illegal migrants made it across the Channel in small boats – the second-highest year on record.
And in one staggering operational blunder, Ethiopian national and asylum seeker Hadush Kebatu, jailed after sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman while living in an asylum hotel in Epping, was mistakenly freed.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has, inevitably, branded Mr Farage, quite possibly his successor, “racist” for suggesting that axing a right to indefinite leave to remain is “immoral”.
Why? It could effectively lead to hundreds of thousands of people who are here legally being deported from the UK.
Politics is so often about how things look.
And many law-abiding and hard-working people are sick and fed up at how it appears the red carpet continues to be rolled out for those who have entered the UK illegally.
Mr Farage should not be accused of racism for suggesting a scorched Earth policy to tackle the deepening crisis, even though a great many reasonable Britons would disagree.
The UK is, and always has been, a welcoming country which for decades has provided sanctuary, safety, and security for those in genuine need.
But a great many ordinary folk feel they are being taken for an enormous ride.
Shameless Labour campaigned on a manifesto pledge to scrap the Conservatives’ Rwanda deportation scheme and, in its very first act after winning the General Election, the “gimmick” was declared “dead and buried”. Instead, Sir Keir promised a more effective approach to tackling illegal immigration. Quite what that is is anyone’s guess.
Rwanda is now seeking £100m that it claims is owed under the axed agreement.
Laughably, the Prime Minister’s official spokesperson said: “The Rwanda scheme was a complete disaster. It wasted £700m of taxpayer cash to return just four volunteers.
“We will robustly defend our position to protect British taxpayers, and we’re getting on with the job of focusing on effective ways to stamp out illegal migration, not costly gimmicks.”
Sir Keir and Labour are stuck in a doom loop of perpetual crisis, having failed repeatedly on a promise to stop the small boat crisis.
Chastened by its humiliating defeat at the Gorton and Denton by-election, expect words similar to those of Ms Merkel when General Election campaigning starts, and Labour plunges to new depths of desperation.
It’s all they have got left.