Women and children to lose out most from Home Office plan to tighten rules on refugee family reunions, experts say – UK politics live

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The Reform UK press conference is starting now. There is a live feed here.

I will post any highlights later.

Today’s announcement about a new communications chief at No 10 (see 10.18am) will be seen by some as an acknowledgment that Labour has done a fairly lousy job of pushing back at the Reform UK/Tory attacks on its small boats record this summer. Frances Ryan makes this argument in her Guardian column today.

Here is an extract.

Few have made it easier for Reform to fill the void than [Keir] Starmer, who could have hardly done more if he had subletted Downing Street out to [Nigel] Farage and washed the towels. It is not that the prime minister hasn’t been working – last month, he disrupted his family holiday in Scotland to fly to Washington DC – or that he should not have had a break, of course, but that after pushing through the disastrous welfare bill, the entire government has seemingly disappeared from public view. The most pressing issues – immigration misinformation, far-right mobilisation, starvation in Gaza – have come and stayed in recent weeks with next to no input from our elected leaders.

Ministers have been noticeably missing in action from media rounds, with Rachel Reeves – the most recognisable figure on the frontbench after Starmer – out of sight working on the autumn budget. The government in effect put its out-of-office on for August (“Taking time away until September. See you in Liverpool!”) and left the inbox to max out.

And here is the full article.

Home Office says small boats arrival numbers in August lower than in past three years

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.

Small boat arrival numbers Photograph: Migration Watch

Former Blair aide Tim Allan joins No 10 as executive director for government communications

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

Darren Jones appointed 'chief secretary to the PM', and put in charge of policy delivery

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. Photograph: Peter Nicholls/Getty Images

Starmer shakes up No 10 operation with mini-reshuffle

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.

Women and childen to lose out most from Home Office plan to tighten rules on refugee family reunions, experts say

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.

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