Shabana Mahmood made an impressive start as Home Secretary. Within her first 100 days, she had set out a tough new plan to ‘stop the boats’, drawing lessons from the experience of Denmark. Yet as we now move from winter to spring, it seems that much of the Labour party is becoming increasingly squeamish about Mahmood’s proposals to double the time it takes for migrants to qualify for permanent residence from five to ten years. The latest to sound the alarm is Angela Rayner, the Labour queen over the water. In a speech last night to the Mainstream group, she declared that it would be ‘un-British’ to change the rules for migrants already in the UK.

‘Enforcing a fair deal is not the same as ripping up a deal halfway through,’ Rayner said. ‘The people already in the system who made a huge investment now fear for their future…we cannot talk about earning a settlement if we keep........

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