Phil Cole

EXCLUSIVE interview with Zack Polanski by @daisyeastlake * Britain should take in more asylum seekers 'At the moment, 5 per cent of Britain is built on. We know that Germany is taking double the amount of people seeking asylum than we are, and France is taking more than we are too. So I think the first thing is to say it’s about taking a fair amount of people in proportion to other people' * Migration debate is driven by racism 'We need to make racism unacceptable again. We’ve seen situations where people from Ukraine have rightly been welcomed into the country with open arms, and so they should be, they’re facing an illegal invasion. But where is that same hospitality to the Sudanese people, Eritrean people, people from Yemen?' * Starmer is 'pushing racist rhetoric' 'I think Nigel Farage is setting the direction and Keir Starmer is catching up as quickly as he can. This is why we see a Labour Party that is tanking in the polls because they refuse to stand for anything and I think the British public are smarter than that. I think they’re kinder than that' * Asylum seekers should be able to work in UK from the moment they arrive 'I think from the moment they arrive in the UK, people should be able to work or should be given the ability to work, because that means they’re then paying into the tax system. Also, very obviously, there are lots of vacancies, both in our NHS, in the care sector, in the construction sector' * Trans women are women, JK Rowling is 'punching down' & 'intensely hateful' 'I often reflect that someone so wealthy could enjoy a peaceful life, but seems to spend time punching down metaphorically to trans people. I think it’s shameful' thetimes.com/uk/politics/ar…