Church of England's most senior bishop criticizes far-right Reform UK’s mass deportation plan

By Aysu Bicer

LONDON (AA) - The Archbishop of York has urged Britain to resist what he called “kneejerk” proposals to deport hundreds of thousands of migrants, warning they would fail to provide a long-term solution to irregular migration.

Speaking to Sky News, Stephen Cottrell, who is currently acting as the spiritual head of the Church of England until a new Archbishop of Canterbury is appointed, criticized the far-right party’s proposal to remove around 600,000 people from the country.

The policy, unveiled by Reform leader Nigel Farage earlier this week, would involve negotiating deportation agreements with regimes such as the Taliban in Afghanistan and the authorities in Iran.

Cottrell said that he has “every sympathy” with people who are concerned about asylum seekers coming to the country illegally. But he argued that the measures would not “solve the problem.”

Asked by presenter Trevor Phillips to respond to those calling for an automatic policy of detention and deportation for anyone entering the UK unlawfully, Cottrell replied: “You haven’t solved the problem. You’ve just put it somewhere else and you’ve done nothing to address the issue of what brings people to this country. And so if you think that’s the answer, you will discover in due course that all you have done is made the problem worse.”

He continued: “Don’t misunderstand me, I have every sympathy with those who find this difficult, every sympathy – as I do with those living in poverty. But… we should actively resist the kind of isolationist, short term kneejerk ‘send them home’.”

Reform’s hardline immigration proposals have become one of the central issues in the UK’s political debate, but they have drawn strong criticism from church leaders, human rights groups and opposition parties.

Farage set out a five-year strategy that would include withdrawing from human rights laws, detaining new arrivals at large removal centers, and sending people to countries where they could face imprisonment, torture, or death.