Here is the text of Yvette Cooper’s statement to MPs about the asylum system.

In a briefing note for journalists, the Home Office has confirmed that from today single adults who are granted asylum will be given 28 days to move out of the hotels, or the housing, where they have been living during the application process. Currently the so-called “move on period” is twice as long.

Danny Shaw, the home affairs commentator and former BBC journalist who briefly worked as a adviser to Cooper, says this is likely to increase homelessness.

Single adults in asylum hotels or housing will have to leave within 28 days of being granted asylum.

At present, it’s 56 days.

This will help cut numbers in hotels - but, as happened before, will lead to refugees sleeping on the streets or in tents

Safe Passage, a charity that supports child refugees, has condemned Yvette Cooper’s decision to suspend refugee family reunion applications. Gunes Kalkan, its head of campaigns, said in a statement:

This blanket suspension on refugee family reunion is simply wrong. This will have disastrous consequences for the unaccompanied children and refugee families we support.

Children, having already survived the horrors of war and persecution, belong with their parents. But this decision will leave them stuck alone and in camps, with no way to reach family or safety. We’re talking about children from conflict and high human rights abuse areas, such as Afghanistan, Sudan and Iran, who have been torn apart from family in the chaos.

Without safe options, like family reunion, more people will be pushed into taking dangerous journeys to reach safety and loved ones. Instead of closing down what few safe routes exist, this government should be opening new safe pathways and expanding family reunion for refugees.

The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants has also condemnd the move. It issued this statement on social media earlier today.

The government wants to make it harder for people who move here to bring their families. Cruelty can’t be the basis of policy.

Instead of pandering to the far right, the govt should help reunite families torn apart by war & torture, not make it harder.

In a briefing note published alongside Yvette Cooper’s statement, the Home Office says the first people are expected to be returned to France under the “one in, one out” scheme later this month.

The SNP’s Pete Wishart told MPs that he thought the government was encouraging Reform UK by refusing to speak up for asylum seekers. He told MPs:

What a country the UK is becoming And rarely has the national mood become so ugly and intimidating. People congregating at hotels, screaming at asylum seekers to go home, the right wing so emboldened they feel the streets belong to them.

Doesn’t [Yvette Cooper] realise that every time she moves on to the ground of Reform, all she is doing is further encouraging and emboldening them?

Wishart said Cooper should try “something different”, and he urged her to say something positive about immigration, and to talk about asylum seekers with “decency and humanity”.

Cooper said she had spoken positively about asylum seekers. But she said the public wanted the asylum system to be “properly controlled and managed”.

Neil Hudson, the Conservative MP for Epping Forest, told Cooper that there was a “tinderbox situation” in Epping because of the asylum seekers being housed in the Bell hotel. He said there had been alleged sexual and physical assaults and protests were now taking place twice a week, sometimes becoming violent.

Our community is in distress. The situation is untenable. This week the schools are back. The hotel is in the wrong place, right near a school, and many concerned parents have contacted me. When will the home secretary and the government listen to us address this issue and do the right and safe thing and close the Bell hotel immediately.

Cooper said asylum hotels had to be closed “as swiftly as possible”, but in “an orderly and sustainable manner”.

Lisa Smart, the Lib Dem home affairs spokesperson, told Cooper that she was worried that tightening the refugee family reunion rules could be “counter-productive” because it could lead to more relatives making small boat crossings to join family members in the UK.

She also said constituents had been in touch to say they were concerned about the number of flags going up on lampposts. People were worried the flags had been put up “by those who seek to divide our community, not bring it together”, Smart said.

In response, Cooper said she “strongly” supported people flying the St George’s flag. The union jack was on Labour’s membership card, she said.

Cooper says the government wants to change the family reunion rules for asylum seekers.

The current rules for family reunion for refugees were designed many years ago to help families separated by war, conflict and persecution, but the way they are now being used has changed.

Even just before the pandemic, refugees who applied to bring family to the UK did so on average more than one or two years after they had been granted protection – long enough for them to be able to get jobs or find housing [so they would be] able to provide their family with some support.

In Denmark and Switzerland, currently those granted humanitarian protection are not able to apply to bring family for at least two years after protection has been granted.

But here in the UK now, however, those applications come in, on average, around a month after protection has been granted – often even before a newly granted refugee has left asylum accommodation.

As a consequence, refugee families who arrive are far more likely to be seeking homelessness assistance, and some councils are finding that more than a quarter of their family homelessness applications are linked to refugee family reunion.

Cooper says this is not sustainable. She says the family reunion rules for refugee sponsors are not as strict as they are for British sponsors. That is not fair, she says.

Finally, the proportion of migrants who have arrived on small boats and do then apply to bring family has also increased sharply in recent years, with signs that smuggler gangs are now able to use the promise of family reunion to promote dangerous journeys to the UK.

Cooper says the government still thinks family reunions are important. So family groups will be prioritised under the returns deal with France, she says.

But, she says, the asylum policy statement coming later this year will set out new family reunion rules, “including looking at contribution requirements, longer periods before newly granted refugees can apply and dedicated controlled arrangements for unaccompanied children and for those fleeing persecution who have family in the UK”.

Cooper says she wants some of these new rules in place by the spring.

But, in the meantime, she says she is bringing forward new immigration rules to temporarily suspend applications under the refugee family reunion route.

In the meantime, we do need to address the immediate pressures on local authorities and the risks from criminal gangs using family reunion as a pull factor to encourage more people onto dangerous boats.

Therefore, we are bringing forward new immigration rules this week to temporarily suspend new applications under the existing dedicated refugee family reunion route.

Until the new framework is introduced, refugees will be covered by the same family migration rules and conditions as everyone else.

Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, is making a statement to MPs about borders and asylum.

She started by saying the Tories left the system in chaos.

People wanted to know the system was under control, she said. She went on:

But that does not mean that people rejected the long and proud history of Britain doing our bit to help those fleeing persecution or conflict, including in the past decade families from Ukraine, Syria and Hong Kong, because it is the British way to do our bit, alongside other countries, to help those who need sanctuary.

Chorley asked Starmer about his birthday, which is tomorrow. What did he want?

Mainly for people not to notice it, Starmer said, because he is at the age where he does not want to acknowledge it. He will be 63.

Q: At the next election you will almost be a pensioner. Will you lead Labour into the next election to serve a full term?

Starmer replied:

I’m definitely going to lead them into the next election. I’ve always said this is a decade of national renewal. I’m really proud and privileged to lead this country as prime minister. I intend to do that into the next election, and that project of renewal is absolutely integral to the next phase of this government, then on into the next election and beyond that.

Although he implied that he would, Starmer in his answer did not actually firmly commit to staying as Labour leader for the whole of this “decade of renewal” (ie, for the entire term of a second parliament). But, given that any questions about leadership that far ahead are extremely hypothetical, it would be unwise to read too much – or indeed, anything – into that.

Starmer told Chorley that he was “really proud” that from today the government is rolling out its pledge to fund childcare for 30 hours a week in England. He said:

This is fantastically important for parents and carers who can go and get on with whatever they want to get on with. For many of them, that may well be going back into work. improving their own economy and the national economy.

For children, it’s hugely important. A child that’s been in childcare, by the time they get to reception year, is likely to be far ahead of children who haven’t had that opportunity.

And you hear these stories, that are real, about the disparity in four-year-olds, some arriving in nappies, some quite articulate. That is a life-changing difference at the age of four.

Starmer also said he he was pleased to learn that nine out of 10 parents got their nursery of choice for their childcare. “So the system is working,” he said.

Q: What do you feel about the debate about England flags going up all over the country. Some people are in favour, but some people see it as racist. What do you think?

Starmer said he was in favour of flags.

I’m a supporter of flags … I’ve got one behind me.

Q: Are in favour of people painting them on roundabouts and hanging them from lampposts?

Starmer replied:

I’m the leader of the Labour party who put the union jack on our Labour party membership cards. I always sit in front of a union jack. I’ve been doing it for years, and it attracted a lot of comment when I started doing it.

In our flat, which is upstairs from here [Starmer and Chorley were speaking in Downing Street], as you know, we’ve got a St George’s flag in our flat.

Q: So you are encouraging people to put up more flags?

Starmer replied:

I’m very encouraging of flags. I think they’re patriotic, and I think they’re a great symbol of our nation.

I don’t think they should be devalued and belittled. And I think sometimes when they’re used purely for divisive purposes, it actually devalues the flag. I don’t want to see that. I’m proud of our flag. I sit in front of our flag, and I’m very, very proud to do so.

Q: What would you say to people who don’t want a hotel in their town housing asylum seekers?

Starmer says he wants to see these hotels closed.

Q: When will this happen?

Starmer says the government has said this will happen by the end of this parliament.

UPDATE: Asked if he would be comfortable with his daughter having to walk past an asylum hotel, Starmer insisted he “completely” understood the concerns of residents, adding:

Local people by and large do not want these hotels in their towns, in their place, nor do I. I’m completely at one with them on that.

Q: What do you say to people who think you have allowed Nigel Farage to make all the running on small boats?

Starmer says this is a really serious issue.

We have to have control of our borders, and I completely get it, and I’m determined that, whether it’s people crossing in the first place, whether it’s people in asylum hotels, or whether it’s returning people, we absolutely have to deal with this.

When it comes to the asylum hotels, I want them emptied. I’ve been really clear about that. I completely understand why people are so concerned about it.

The only way to empty them is an orderly, systematic working through of the cases as quickly as possible and then returning those people who should not be here.

Starmer says 35,000 people have been returned already.

And he goes on to attack Reform UK. Referring to Nigel Farage, Starmer says:

The difference here is between an orderly, sensible way of actually fixing a problem we inherited from the Tories [and] fanciful arrangements that just not going to work.

Nigel Farage and Reform are just the politics of grievance. They feed on grievance. They don’t want the problem solved because they’ve got no reason to exist if the problems are solved.

And so the contrast in politics is a Labour government rebuilding the country in the way that we said we would, or this politics of grievance that simply puts forward unworkable, fanciful ideas that are actually not fair to the public – to put forward, yet again, ideas that just aren’t going to work.

The BBC is now broadcasting the Keir Starmer interview. Matt Chorley is asking the questions.

Q: You made a speech a year ago saying things would get worse before they got better? When will things get better?

Starmer says he knows that people want things to improve. He felt it was important to level with people. He knows they want change “as quickly as possible”.

He is now focused on delivery, he says.

Here a year on in, what I would say is we spent the first year sort of fixing the foundations, if you like, doing the hard yards.

But we now enter into phase two of the government, which is where we focus on delivery, delivery, delivery, and start to show what a difference a Labour government really makes.

And so yes, it was always going to take time … and the frustration I completely understand. I want to go further and faster and that’s amongst the reasons I’ve done some changes here at Number 10 today.

Downing Street has defended Angela Rayner, the deputy PM, over claims that there was something improper about her purchase of a £800,000 flat in Hove. The Conservatives, and Tory-supporting papers, have suggested that she should have paid more in stamp duty because the new flat is a second home. Rayner has not commented on the story, but her allies have said the Hove flat is not a second home for stamp duty purposes because she no longer has a stake in the family home in Greater Manchester occupied by her former partner, from whom she has been separated for some time.

Asked if the PM had confidence in Rayner, the PM’s spokesperson replied:

Yes, the prime minister works closely with the deputy prime minister … on delivering on the public’s priorities.

The spokesperson also said that Rayner was not able to disclose full details of the ownership of the house in Greater Manchester because of a court order. But Rayner was trying to get that changed so she could release more information, he suggested.

There is a court order which restricts her from providing further information, which she’s urgently working on rectifying in the interests of public transparency.

Libby Brook is the Guardian’s Scotland correspondent.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar has warned that the forthcoming Scottish election campaign is “going to be ugly” as he addressed MSPs and activists at the start of the new Holyrood session.

But he dismissed Reform as “noise”, saying “all they do is distract from SNP failures”.

Sarwar condemned the SNP’s “cynical” tactics at June’s Hamilton byelection, which Scottish Labour won from the SNP. During the campaign Reform used an advert attacking Sarwar that was deemed racist. The SNP claimed the contest was a two-horse race between the Nationalists and Reform. Sarwar said today that was “cynical” and a “deliberate attempt by John Swinney to use the poison of Reform as a smokescreen for his failure”.

Asked what his strategy would be for to counter continued racist attacks and misinformation, Sarwar said:

We will call it out for what it is which is a chancer [Nigel Farage] who doesn’t understand Scotland, but wants to come here and try and divide Scotland for his own agenda.

Sarwar added that he could “understand those Scots that are considering Reform often feel a genuine sense of hopelessness” but promised to build support “based on like-minded individuals who want to challenge those noisy minorities, whether it’s the SNP or Reform and Farage”.

While Sarwar is still – like UK leader Keir Starmer – leaning into the language of understanding those voters attracted to Reform, it’s worth noting that today he sounded less ameliorative than before, perhaps marking a change of tack for the Scottish Labour leader.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing this morning the PM’s spokesperson said that the mini No 10 reshuffle this morning showed the government was now focusing on delivery. The spokesperson said:

[The reshuffle] reflects the prime minister’s view that phase one of this government was about fixing the foundations and the second phase has to be about a relentless focus on delivery.

When it was put to her that the need to appoint a chief secretary to the PM implied Keir Starmer thought delivery had not gone well so far, the PM’s press secretary (who deals with party political questions) replied:

The prime minister came into government with commitment to deliver change for working people. He spent the first year getting on with that job …

Of course, the prime minister is always determined to make sure that we are straining every sinew to deliver for the British people. That is what they rightly expect and what he comes to work and focuses on every single day.

Kemi Badenoch has restated her claim that she was offered a place to study medicine at Stanford university in the US when she was 16 – after the Guardian published comments from the Stanford admissions officer at the time, and other experts, saying her story was not plausible.

Here is Jessica Elgot’s report.

Asked to respond today during a visit in Reigate, Badenoch said:

All I will say is that I remember the very day those letters came to me, it was not just from Stanford, I was 16, I had done very well in my SATs.

But this is 30 years ago, I don’t have the papers, and what the Guardian is doing is reporting on hearsay rather than talking about what the government is doing.

I’m very happy to stand by what I said – when I was 16 I did get an offer, and I’ve explained what that was, and the Guardian can try and cast aspersions as much as they like, but they’d be better off looking at this government’s woeful record and the CVs of the people who are running the country now, which has been proven to be less than satisfactory.

My colleague Peter Walker was at the Reform UK press conference this morning. He has summarised some of the key lines from Richard Tice, the party’s deputy leader, on Bluesky.

As well as defending Reform UK’s plan to pay despotic regimes like the Taliban’s to take back asylum seekers from Britain, Tice claimed that some parents with special needs children are “abusing” the system that allows their children to be taken by taxi to special needs schools. Councils in England spent more than £2bn a year on transport for special needs pupils, who often have to be educated in special schools quite a long way from where they live and who cannot travel alone on public transport.

Tice implied some of the parents were lazy.

Peter says:

Reform UK say that by changing the way local government pension funds are invested, and the charges levied on this, they can save between 6% and 8% of total council tax spending, allowing council tax to be lowered, or social care improved.

This is all very Richard Tice - he is hosting the press conference – and also has inevitable echoes of ‘£350m a week for the NHS’.

I asked Tice if, given his views on climate change, what the Church of England thinks about refugees, and now pension funds, whether he has no need of experts. As part of the answer he says there are “widely differing views” on climate change.

(Tice is right about this. There are differing views. Some are right, and some are wrong.)

Asked if a Reform govt would pay money to the Taliban or Iran to return refugees, Tice says: “When you’re in business, sometimes you do business with people that you may not like.... We’re not responsible for all of the bad things that happen by bad leaders elsewhere in the world.”

Richard Tice, asked about saving money on transporting SEND children to school: “There are some parents, they want to save themselves the opportunity to get up in the morning, set the alarm and crack on and drive their children to school. So they’re using it, abusing the free taxi service.”

While some parents get free transport provided by councils for their Send children, many parents have to contribute, or pay the full costs themselves.

The Conservative party has responded to the mini No 10 reshuffle by claiming it shows the government is in crisis. In a statement Kevin Hollinrake, the Tory chair, said:

This chaotic reshuffle shows a Downing Street in crisis – totally distracted from fixing the damage they’ve done to the economy, jobs and small businesses. It’s like firefighters arguing about the hose whilst the house burns down.

Inflation has doubled, borrowing costs have soared, and Britain is on the brink of a debt crisis, with working people left to pay the price through higher taxes. Only the Conservatives, under new leadership, will take a responsible approach to the public finances and ensure our economy grows whilst we live within our means.

The Conservatives and Reform UK both want the UK to withdraw from the European convention on human rights because they believe this would allow the government to more easily deport asylum seekers. The Conservatives have not formally declare this as policy yet, but an announcement is due at their autumn conference and Kemi Badenoch has made it clear where her thinking is heading.

Labour has argued that this would undermine the Good Friday agreement, the foundation of peace in Northern Ireland, because ECHR membership is an integral part of that deal.

Today Policy Exchange, a Tory thinktank, has published a report claiming that this argument is bogus because the protections ensured by the ECHR references in the agreement could be delivered in another way. It has been written by Conor Casey, a law lecturer, Richard Ekins, a law professor at Oxford University, and Sir Stephen Laws, a former head of the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel, the government department that drafts legislation.

Here is an extract summarising their argument.

The Belfast agreement is made up of two closely related agreements. The first is the British-Irish agreement, which is a treaty between the UK and Ireland. The second is the multiparty agreement, which is a political agreement between the British and Irish governments and several different political parties of Northern Ireland, an agreement that provides the foundation for the peace process. This political agreement turns in part on various commitments made by the British government and the Irish government. In signing the British-Irish agreement, the UK and Ireland agreed “to support, and where appropriate implement, the multiparty agreement”, but it is only the former agreement that is binding in international law.

The British-Irish agreement does not refer to the ECHR and none of its terms suggest in any way that either the UK or Ireland, or both of them, were undertaking to remain member states of the ECHR in perpetuity …

The multiparty agreement does include several references to the ECHR. The context of the multiparty agreement, which includes the troubled history of Northern Ireland and fears about the risks of abuse of devolved power, makes it very clear that these references concern the importance of the law of Northern Ireland imposing limits on the new assembly and on public bodies exercising devolved power. This report considers closely each reference to the ECHR in the multiparty agreement and shows that, as one would expect in view of the context of the agreement, each reference concerns domestic law and has nothing whatsoever to do with the position in international law. That is, the references to the ECHR in the multiparty agreement have nothing to do with the individual right of petition to the Strasbourg court, a right which the Belfast Agreement does not create or rely upon, or, more generally, with the UK or Ireland’s acceptance of the Strasbourg court’s jurisdiction or its developing jurisprudence as a matter of international law. British or Irish withdrawal from the ECHR would in no way undercut, breach or cut across the multiparty agreement.

On legal/academic Bluesky, there are plenty of experts who disagree. This is from John Springford from the Centre for European Reform.

It’s fascinating watching the same cycle of f%¥£ing around and finding out happening. Some anti-ECHR lawyers in Britain might say this [that leaving the ECHR won’t affect the Good Friday agreement], but Irish and EU politicians think differently, and politics will determine their reaction, not law alone.

These are from George Peretz KC, chair of the Society of Labour Lawyers.

I’d add two pretty obviously dubious claims in the PE report (read it carefully and you’ll see weasel words creeping in to hide the weaknesses): (1) that the (express) agreement to incorporate the ECHR into NI law with access to courts and remedies doesn’t mean “ECHR as interpreted by the ECtHR);

and (2) that that agreement is confined to devolved bodies as opposed to the UK government acting in NI under NI law (when any act of the UK government in NI is of course under NI law).

Strip those dodgy claims out and you are left with the point that if the UK left the ECHR, in order to comply with the GFA the ECHR (as interpreted by the ECtHR) would still have to apply in NI - including to UK government decisions and UK legislation such as immigration.

That result is so obviously problematic as to rule it out as a practical suggestion.

Further, the paper doesn’t deny (it can’t) that leaving the ECHR would entitle the EU at once to terminate Trade and Cooperation provisions of great importance to immigration control and fighting crime. The EU could also terminate the TCA as a whole.

And this is from Glen O’Hara, a history professor.

Shall I tell you what’s wrong with the Policy Exchange nonsense? Okay: I’m about the most conciliatory Irish unity sceptic there could possibly be among Nationalists. Without ECHR, I would consider the Belfast Agreement, and the compromises and agreements the Union rests on, as dissolved.

Back to small boats, and in her Commons statement this afternoon Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, will suggest that the government is making progress in disrupting the smuggling gangs. The Home Office says there were fewer small boats crossing the channel in August than in any other August since 2019.

This statistic is less impressive than it sounds, because boats have got bigger over the past six years, and they are increasingly overcrowded. The Home Office says that is because the authorities are getting better at seizing boats and engines.

The Home Office also says the number of people arriving on small boats was lower this August than in the past three years, “despite an identical number of crossing days as last year”. It says:

The 55 boats to cross the channel this August is the lowest total for the month since 2019, when 34 boats crossed near the start of the small boats crisis. Since then, there were 116 small boats in August 2020, 99 in 2021, 192 in 2022, 102 in 2023, and 75 in 2024, meaning that the number of successful boat crossings this August has been less than half the average of the previous five years (55 compared to 116.8 – 47%).

The shortage of boats has also contributed to unprecedented levels of overcrowding. Average boat occupancy this August was 64.8, the highest monthly average on record, compared to an average of 59 over the first seven months of the year.

The 3,567 arrivals in August 2025 compares to 4,149 last August, 5,369 in August 2023, and 8,631 in August 2022, which was the highest monthly total for arrivals on record.

But overall small boat arrival numbers are still at a record level for this point of the year, as this Migration Watch UK graphic illustrates.

Downing Street has also announced that Tim Allan, who worked as Alastair Campbell’s deputy in the early days of New Labour but who left No 10 to set up Portand, a PR company, is joining Keir Starmer’s team as the government’s executive director of communications.

This is from my colleague Pippa Crerar on the move.

Big shake up of the No 10 comms operation too.

Tim Allan, an adviser to Tony Blair who went on to fund PR giant Portland, coming in as executive director of govt comms.

(This is a political role separate from that of David Dinsmore who has been tasked with improving the civil service comms operation).

James Lyons, No 10’s director of comms for strategy, is stepping down, but Steph Driver, his counterpart for day-to-day comms, and who is close to Starmer, stays put, answering to Allan.

And these are from Politico’s Anne McElvoy.

A huge change in the arrival of Tim Allan of strategic communications weakness in govt. Also massively strengthens the arm of the more “New Labour” constituency close to PM. And gather there was unease in some quarters about how the existing number 10 communications set up would work with an overall government head of Comms in David Dinsmore. That won’t be such a problem for Tim Allan.

Interesting that it’s one Blairite in with T Allan and one out in the Downing Street pack shuffle as Liz Lloyd leaves.

This was a waste of an experience’d hire: but never quite grafted on to the Starmer vibe and vice versa. So the policy jobs remain in the penumbra of people who have been close to KS – and the overall comms will be run by someone who’s default setting is to aim for the centre or even the right of centre.

I’m not saying this will work, but it is something of a challenge

Here is the Downing Street news release about the mini No 10 reshuffle, including Darren Jones becoming chief secretary (minister of state) to the PM. Jones was chief secretary to the Treasury. (See 9.43am.)

This is a new post. There is no obvious precedent, although Boris Johnson also decided to bring a minister into No 10 in a delivery/enforcer role when he made Steve Barclay his chief of staff. (That appointment was not generally seen as a success.)

Keir Starmer already has a chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney. But McSweeney is seen as better at strategising, campaigning and electioneering than he is at performance management. Jones, a spreadsheet enthusiast, will “work collaboratively across UK government to drive forward progress in key policy areas, reporting directly to the prime minister”, No 10 says.

Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the Treasury, has been moved to a new senior role in Downing Street as Keir Starmer attempts to get a grip on delivery before what is likely to be a tumultuous autumn for the government, Pippa Crerar and Peter Walker report.

Good morning. August used to be known as the “silly season” in newspaper offices because, with little proper news happening, journalists had to resort to trivia. Then we had Brexit, and the four-week silly season got replaced by eight years of chaos. This year there has been a slight reversion to the pre-2016 norm because the UK political debate over the summer has been entirely dominated by a debate about small boats and irregular migration which has not been fully rational. The claim that asylum seekers are posing a significant threat to public safety is classic xenophobic scaremongering, of the kind that has been a factor in British public life for centuries. (There is a good explanation of why the evidence does not support the scaremongering here.) But the issue isn’t remotely silly either. Small boat arrivals are a huge policy challenge for the government, because of the costs and the pressures on public services, but above all because the public want them to stop.

And, with the summer recess now over and MPs returning to the Commons, this is still the top item on the government’s agenda. As Kiran Stacey reports, Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, is due to make a statement to the Commons on this topic this afternoon. She will cover various topics, including providing more detail on the government’s plan to restrict the extent to which article 8 of the European convention on human rights (the right to family life) can be used by asylum seekers to avoid deporting and giving an update on the “one in, one out” returns deal with France. But she will also give details of plans to restrict the ability of people granted asylum to bring family members to the UK. Kiran says:

Cooper will promise to overhaul the UK’s family reunion policy, which allows people to bring their partners and children to the country once they are granted refugee status.

The number of people who entered on such visas has risen sharply since 2022, with just over 20,000 being granted in the year to June 2025 – a 30% rise on the previous 12 months.

Officials say the rise in refugee numbers is in part to blame, but they also believe the UK now has a more lax regime than many nearby countries after moves elsewhere in Europe to tighten their rules.

In Denmark, for example, refugees must prove financial stability before being allowed to bring over family members. Cooper is understood to be looking at similar changes, as well as setting a minimum period refugees must be settled before being allowed to invite their families.

This proposal has already been criticised by refugee advocates. Jon Featonby, chief policy analyst at the Refugee Council, says 90% of those affected will be women and children. He has posted these on Bluesky.

The immigration white paper proposed putting in financial and language requirements. Financial requirements for refugees who have been stuck in the asylum system unable to work, and language requirements for children escaping war zones.

This will either force families to stay split up, leaving thousands of women and children in extremely dangerous situations, or it forces them into dangerous journeys. Either way, this has terrible consequences.

In the year to June 2025, 92% of refugee family reunion visas were given to women and children. More than half went to children. Two-thirds to people from Syria, Afghanistan, Eritrea, Iran and Sudan. It helps integration and provides a safe route. Family reunion should be easier, not harder.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Morning: Kemi Badenoch and James Cleverly, the shadow housing secretary, are on a visit to Reigate where they are due to speak to the media.

11am: Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, holds a press conference highlighting plans for councils to save money via changes to the way they invest their pension funds.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

2.30pm: Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, takes questions in the Commons.

After 3.30pm: At least two ministerial statements are expected in the Commons, from Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, on the asylum system, and from David Lammy, the foreign secretary, on Gaza.

4pm: The full written judgment is due to be published explaining the court decision on Friday blocking the temporary injuntion saying asylum seekers should be removed from the Bell hotel in Epping.

Afternoon: The Liberal Democrats hope to make an application in the Commons to the Speaker for an emergency debate on Gaza.

If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line when comments are open (normally between 10am and 3pm at the moment), or message me on social media. I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word.

If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use social media. You can reach me on Bluesky at @andrewsparrowgdn.bsky.social. The Guardian has given up posting from its official accounts on X, but individual Guardian journalists are there, I still have my account, and if you message me there at @AndrewSparrow, I will see it and respond if necessary.

I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos. No error is too small to correct. And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.