- Nigel Farage proposes suspending asylum for five years if Reform UK forms a government.
- The plan would cancel pending claims and leave 90,000 appeals unheard, with claimants marked for deportation.
- As of October twelfth, twenty twenty-six, the pledge remains a proposal and would require legislation.
Nigel Farage pledged Monday to suspend the UK asylum system for a full parliamentary term if his party forms a government, rejecting new applications and cancelling claims already in progress. The proposed pause could last up to five years.
The plan would also abolish the tribunal system that hears asylum appeals. It would leave roughly 90,000 outstanding asylum and humanitarian-protection appeals unheard, with claimants marked for deportation instead.
Farage said the party would make no new grants of refugee status or humanitarian protection during the suspension. It would also review refugee grants from the previous five years.
He presented the pledge as a security measure. “The country is currently facing a national security emergency and the first duty of government is to protect its citizens,” Farage said. He added: “We cannot accept more asylum seekers while we still have no idea how many people are in the country illegally and the threat they pose.”
Labour, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats each challenged the pledge
Bridget Phillipson, Labour Party chairperson, called the plan a “clear sign of desperation and weakness.” She accused Farage of “casting around for more and more extreme policies” as he faced political and financial difficulties.
Phillipson said Labour would seek to control immigration through enforcement rather than “abandoning the asylum system altogether.” She argued that rejecting people fleeing war and persecution would be an assault on shared British values.
Chris Philp, the Conservative Party’s shadow home secretary, said Reform’s proposals “largely copy” Conservative policies. He pointed to plans to bar asylum claims from people who entered the UK illegally, abolish the immigration tribunal, end Labour’s resettlement routes and leave the European Convention on Human Rights.
“Only the Conservatives have a serious and credible plan to fix our borders,” Philp said. Max Wilkinson, the Liberal Democrats’ home-affairs spokesperson, accused both parties of helping create the current system and exploiting its failures.
The removal plan reaches beyond the pending appeal caseload
The party estimates that about 400,000 people could become liable for deportation under its wider proposals. That figure includes people granted asylum, visa overstayers and people from countries a Reform government would designate safe.
The estimate is separate from an earlier projection. Reform had previously said its broader plan to bar people arriving by small boat could lead to about 600,000 deportations over five years.
Reform would close legal refugee routes and resettlement schemes, and reprioritise Home Office staff to examine earlier grants. Its pledge would reach people admitted through protection pathways as well as those with pending claims.
The party has proposed using visa bans, tariffs, airline restrictions and transit restrictions against countries that refuse to accept deportees. It has named Pakistan, Somalia, Eritrea, Syria, Afghanistan and Sudan as potential targets.
Where a person could not be returned to their country of nationality, Reform says it would seek a third-country arrangement. The party says it would negotiate deals in “extreme cases” for another country to take custody of deportees.
The party’s proposed legal changes would not erase every obstacle
Reform says it would withdraw the UK from the European Convention on Human Rights, repeal the Human Rights Act 1998 and disapply the 1951 Refugee Convention. The party has framed those steps as a way to limit legal challenges to its proposed system.
The UK remains bound by the Refugee Convention, including its non-refoulement principle, as well as domestic and human-rights law. A decision to label a claimant or refugee for removal would not, on its own, settle whether deportation was lawful.
The plan could face litigation over procedural fairness, protection from return to danger and access to an effective remedy. Reform’s proposed changes would require legislation, and the policy would likely prompt challenges in UK courts and international forums.
The pledge reverses the direction of recent asylum policy
In March 2026, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said refugees granted protection would receive temporary protection, with their status reviewed every 30 months. She has also announced the reopening of a refugee-resettlement scheme.
About one-quarter of the people expected to enter through the reopened routes would be Palestinians and Afghan women and girls. Reform says there is “no mandate” for resettlement schemes and that people admitted through them would be deported.
The new proposal follows a pledge made in April 2026 to review asylum claims from the previous five years if Reform won the next general election. That earlier commitment focused on reviewing claims; the new one would void pending applications, end appeal hearings and refuse new protection grants during the proposed term.
As of October 12, 2026, the pledge remains a political proposal, not a change in force. Any government seeking to implement it would have to legislate, with individual protection and human-rights constraints still relevant to removal decisions.
This article provides general information and is not legal advice. Consult a qualified immigration attorney about your specific case.
