The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, has taken aim at Nigel Farage’s latest proposal on migration, warning that Reform UK’s plan for mass deportations won’t fix

anything in the long run.

Speaking on Sky News with Trevor Phillips, Cottrell said he understands why people are worried about migrants entering the country illegally, but argued that sending hundreds of thousands of people back is a “kneejerk” reaction that only makes the situation worse.

Farage’s party recently unveiled a proposal to deport around 600,000 people, suggesting deals could even be struck with governments like the Taliban in Afghanistan and Iran to make it happen. Cottrell dismissed that as unrealistic and short-sighted.

“You haven’t solved the problem,” he said when asked about the “lock them up and deport them” approach. “All you’ve done is push it somewhere else. You’ve done nothing to deal with why people are coming here in the first place. If you think that’s the answer, you’ll find you’ve only made the problem worse.”

Cottrell stressed that he sympathises both with people struggling to cope with migration in the UK and with those fleeing poverty and conflict abroad—but insisted the country must resist what he called isolationist, “send them home” politics.

When pressed directly on Farage, he said: “Mr Farage is saying what he’s saying, but he’s not offering any long-term solutions to the global challenges that are driving migration.”

Farage, for his part, has brushed off criticism from church leaders, suggesting they’re “out of touch” with ordinary people. At the launch of Reform’s plan, he argued his party was standing up for “family, community, and country.” Photo by fourthandfifteen, Wikimedia commons.