Zia Yusuf has said Reform will not let lawyers run the country, but if they want to be as radical as they claim, they will need very good legal advice to prevent challenges in the courts, says Andrew Lomas

Last week, Nigel Farage outlined a series of changes that a Reform Government would make to immigration rules, including abolishing indefinite leave to remain. In the Q&A that followed, Zia Yusuf – Reform’s policy chief – was asked whether the changes would face legal challenges, to which he responded “the fact these questions are even asked in a country like this is just a function of learned helplessness… The answer is primary legislation and Parliament”. When quoted on X later in the day, Yusuf doubled down, stating that “Reform will not let lawyers run the country any more.”

Yusuf’s reference to a learned helplessness in British politics is a fair one: as a nation, we seem to have forgotten that Parliament can just do stuff, and instead look to the judiciary to stop things we don’t like. But our political culture also suffers from a learned laziness, with a ruling class who find it more convenient to govern via delegated powers (which are amenable to judicial review) rather than engage with the altogether more time-consuming task of persuading Parliament to pass primary legislation (which, as a matter of orthodox constitutional law, is not). This in itself increases the number........

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