Conservatives promised to “stop the boats”. Labour mocked them, but issued its own pledge to “smash the gangs” – meaning the gangs responsible for sending dinghies across the Channel. You can understand why both parties are talking about small boats. More than 32,000 arrived this way in 2025, and voters are understandably upset about illegal immigration.

But that’s not the only thing worrying the public. Sky-high levels of legal migration are also a concern, and it’s a topic the traditional parties are scared to tackle head-on. Only Nigel Farage and Reform have grasped the nettle and come out with a plan with a real chance of getting the numbers down.

Mr Farage is announcing tough measures designed to make the UK a less attractive place for foreigners to live, and, to be blunt, to force some people to leave. That includes abolishing indefinite leave to remain, which gives people the right to live and work in the UK permanently – and to claim benefits – and making them reapply for visas every five years. Crucially, even people granted indefinite leave to remain in the past will have it removed.

In addition, the entitlement to benefits will be axed. If you’re not British, you won’t get benefits.

It’s his way of telling voters worried about sky-high levels of immigration that at last there is an opportunity to elect a government that will listen to them. Reform says openly that this will force “hundreds of thousands of people” to leave.

Why are voters upset? Last year, a total of 948,000 people migrated into the UK. It’s a huge number, more than the population of any city except for London and Birmingham.

Some of these were temporary visitors. For example, they included 280,000 students, who generally stay for a few years and leave.

But many stay permanently. And last year, just 513,000 people left the UK, giving a net migration figure of 431,000.

It’s a lot, and it was actually higher previously, with net migration reaching 906,000 in the 12 months to June 2023.

Nearly a fifth of all people in England and Wales, 18%, were born overseas, according to the Office for National Statistics.

Some people on the Left argue that there’s nothing wrong with this. They say we need migrants to staff the NHS, and that immigration creates economic growth.

Critics ask why we can’t train British people to be doctors and nurses, and argue that what matters is economic output per person, not the total size of the economy.

Either way, the fact is that very large numbers of British people, of all backgrounds and ethnicity, think immigration is too high and politicians probably ought to listen to them, just as they should listen to voters when they express opinions about health, education or any other aspect of government policy.

Labour Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch have also said they want to cut immigration.

But will they set out plans that might actually get the numbers down? Until today, the answer was no. They were too scared of being branded anti-immigrant and upsetting some of their liberal-minded supporters.

After Nigel’s announcement, however, just wait and see what happens. Where Reform UK leads, the others will follow. Don’t be surprised if both Labour and the Tories come out with tough new policies on legal immigration that would have been unthinkable a couple of years ago.