{"id":764794,"date":"2026-09-09T07:20:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T07:20:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/764794\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T07:20:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T07:20:14","slug":"reform-uk-says-migrant-deal-was-ratified-by-far-right-national-rally-president-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/764794\/","title":{"rendered":"Reform UK says migrant deal was ratified by far-right National Rally president | France"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reform UK has insisted its deal with France\u2019s far-right National Rally<\/a> to return migrants back across the channel was fully approved by the party and signed off by its president, Jordan Bardella, amid a furious backlash in France.<\/p>\n

The agreement unveiled on Friday between Nigel Farage and Bardella, who is the 30-year-old protege of presidential candidate Marine Le Pen<\/a>, appeared to directly contradict Le Pen\u2019s long-held policy of refusing to accept the return of those who arrive in the UK in small boats from France.<\/p>\n

Le Pen was pressed for her position by journalists from France<\/a> TV, the state broadcaster, on Monday. Le Pen declined to comment, saying she would talk about the issue soon, but at a time of her choosing.<\/p>\n

In 2021, Le Pen said she wanted a rewriting of border agreements for the UK to specifically send people arriving on boats back to their countries of origin, instead of returning them to France.<\/p>\n

Since the agreement, Bardella has come under fire from political parties in France for signing the deal, with Benjamin Haddad, the Europe<\/a> minister, criticising Bardella for \u201csubmission\u201d that was \u201cagainst our interests and sovereignty\u201d.<\/p>\n

Some French media have questioned whether Bardella was duped by Reform, querying whether the French translation accurately conveyed the meaning by Farage that the National Rally (RN) was prepared to accept any migrants back who travel by small boat.<\/p>\n

However, a Reform spokesperson said it was \u201csigned off by both Bardella and the presidential team\u201d, that the policy was included in the French version as well as the English, and it could \u201cconfirm both parties are fully on board\u201d.<\/p>\n

Until the summer, Bardella had been considered as a potential replacement for Le Pen in next spring\u2019s presidential election but will now run as her future prime minister. In July, when a Paris appeal court upheld Le Pen\u2019s conviction for embezzling European parliament funds, her ban from running for office was reduced, allowing her to stand.<\/p>\n

Farage has kept Le Pen at arm\u2019s length, while having cultivated good relations with Bardella over the past year, but he is rumoured to be planning to meet her later in the autumn.<\/p>\n

He previously rejected the idea of a tie-up in 2014 in the European parliament when he accused Le Pen\u2019s party of having a history of \u201cprejudice and antisemitism\u201d, which she said was slander. Last week, Farage said he would not have done a deal with the party when led by Jean-Marie Le Pen, Marine\u2019s father, a convicted Holocaust denier who co-founded the Front National in 1972. Le Pen expelled her father from the party in 2015. Farage praised her, saying she had got rid of \u201cextreme elements\u201d.<\/p>\n

At the heart of the row in France is the wording of the document Farage brought out for Bardella to sign with him on stage in Birmingham, calling it a memorandum of understanding.<\/p>\n

Both texts, presented side by side in English and French, state that, if Farage and Bardella become prime ministers of their respective countries, the UK will intercept boats launched from the French coast, and that France will return people onboard to their countries of origin.<\/p>\n

But the English text carried an extra phrase saying \u201cFrance will ordinarily accept these persons\u201d who would then be returned to their home country. This appeared to show that Bardella was promising to accept returned persons in France, which contradicts the long-held position of RN.<\/p>\n

France TV said RN denied any controversy, saying the text was only a declaration of intention that would be refined at a later point. Speaking in Italy over the weekend, Bardella suggested his party in government would prevent migrants from reaching France by much tougher border controls, resulting in the numbers crossing to the UK being much lower.<\/p>\n

However, RN\u2019s opponents were critical of Bardella for signing a memorandum on immigration on stage with Farage.<\/p>\n

The MP, Sacha Houli\u00e9, an ally of the centre-left would-be presidential candidate, Raphael Glucksmann, wrote on X about what he called \u201ca miserable episode where the whole of France could see Mr Bardella used as a doormat by the English far-right.\u201d He told the RN: \u201cYou claim to be patriots, you\u2019re cowards.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gabriel Attal, the former centrist prime minister and presidential candidate, wrote on X: \u201cTo applause from his party members, Nigel Farage<\/a> made Jordan Bardella sign a memorandum to ensure that all migrants intercepted in the Channel are sent back to France. Either Jordan Bardella doesn\u2019t understand English or he is shamefully weak when it comes to defending French interests. And I think he does understand English.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00c9douard Philippe, a former prime minister and centre-right candidate, said it was an example of hypocrisy and division in Bardella\u2019s party. Philippe said it looked like Bardella found it difficult to stand up to Farage in order to \u201cprotect French interests\u201d.<\/p>\n

Xavier Bertrand, the rightwing head of the northern Hauts-de-France region, wrote on X that in agreeing that France alone would take responsibility for returning people to their home countries, Bardella was \u201creducing France to the status of Britain\u2019s subcontractor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chris Philp, the Conservative shadow home secretary, said: \u201cReform UK\u2019s deal with Jordan Bardella is a complete farce \u2026 Time and again, Reform prove they are fundamentally unserious with grand claims for the cameras, with none of the detail or hard work that might survive actual scrutiny.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Reform UK has insisted its deal with France\u2019s far-right National Rally to return migrants back across the channel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":764795,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-764794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764794","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=764794"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764794\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/764795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=764794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=764794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=764794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}