The Left’s meltdown over Starmer’s ‘Enoch Powell’ speech shows why Reform will win the next election

For once, the PM has said something in tune with the average Briton – and those who are supposedly on his side are punishing him for it

Michael Deacon Daily Telegraph 

14 May 2025 

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Congratulations to the British Left. This week they’ve achieved something extraordinary. Something that I’d hitherto assumed to be impossible.

They’ve made Sir Keir Starmer look good.

Not on purpose, admittedly. It’s been completely by accident. None the less, they’ve managed it. Because, thanks to their utterly unhinged reaction to his speech about immigration, the Prime Minister now seems like a beacon of common sense, in comparison.

Ever since Monday morning, any number of Left-wing politicians (including some from Sir Keir’s own Labour party) have been denouncing his rhetoric as “divisive”, and even “dangerous”. This is daft enough. What’s downright bonkers, however, is that some of them have, in all seriousness, been likening it to Enoch Powell’s “Rivers of Blood”.

John McDonnell, Jeremy Corbyn’s old sidekick, claimed that Sir Keir’s speech “shockingly echoes the divisive language of Enoch Powell”. Zarah Sultana, the Corbynista MP for Coventry South, furiously agreed. So did Zack Polanski, who’s standing to become the next leader of the Greens. Even cuddly Sir Ed Davey, leader of the Lib Dems, joined in.

I’m sorry, but such a comparison is so screamingly detached from reality, it only reinforces my longstanding conviction that Margaret Thatcher’s biggest mistake was shutting down the lunatic asylums. Exactly which part of “Rivers of Blood” is Sir Keir alleged to have “echoed”? Did he use the phrase “wide-grinning piccaninnies”? Did he claim that “negroes” have been pushing “excreta” through the letterboxes of terrified old ladies? Did he warn the nation that, the way things are going, “the black man” will soon “have the whip hand” over “the white man”?

No. He did not. All Sir Keir did was politely suggest that, if people from abroad wish to come and live in Britain, they should ideally learn to speak English, otherwise they might find it a tiny bit difficult to get a job and fit in. Most British people, I imagine, would consider this a far from unreasonable expectation. Especially given that, just two months ago, official statistics revealed that almost a million of the immigrants already living in this country speak little or no English. Hence Sir Keir’s point that we “risk becoming an island of strangers”. Obviously we’ll be strangers if we don’t speak the same language, because we won’t be able to communicate.

So no, it’s hardly Enoch Powell. Especially when you bear in mind that Powell made his “Rivers of Blood” speech in the late 1960s – a period during which there were more people leaving this country than entering it. Imagine if Powell had been told that, in little more than half a century, net immigration would reach almost a million a year. By the time he’d regained consciousness, I suspect he’d have had something a little stronger to say than, “Oh well, as long as they know how to ask, ‘Care for another cup of tea, my dear fellow?’, I suppose that’s fine.”

Yet that, in essence, is all Sir Keir said on Monday. The Left’s reaction, however, has been so shriekingly hysterical, you’d think he’d delivered his speech in a pointy white hood. Indeed, they keep wailing that, merely by talking about immigration, he’s “playing into the hands of Reform”.

But he isn’t. They are.

They plainly don’t realise it. But their response provides conclusive proof that they’re still wildly out of touch with the ordinary voter. On Tuesday a snap YouGov poll showed that a clear majority of the British public (and, funnily enough, a clear majority of Labour voters) agree with Sir Keir’s sentiments. And what will this majority think, when they hear all this howling about “Rivers of Blood” from politicians who seem to think that even the mildest form of border control heralds the imminent rebirth of Nazism?

A fair chunk, I’ll bet, will think: “God, they really don’t get it, do they? Looks like this Farage bloke had a point. His lot seem to be the only party who genuinely agree with us on immigration. Maybe I should vote for them, too.”

Effectively, then, the Left are helping Mr Farage. In fact, I think their meltdown over Starmer’s speech shows why Reform will win the next election.

Poor Sir Keir. For once, he’s actually said something that’s in tune with the average voter. And his own side seems determined to punish him for it.