Why Nigel Farage’s ‘Australia-style’ border policy is doomed to fail
From our UK edition
When I served as Australia’s High Commissioner in London, I was naturally flattered by how often British politicians and officials invoked Australian precedents as examples of successful policy. Nowhere was that more evident than with immigration and border control. The ‘Australian-style points system’ became a cliché for describing best-practice migration policy. I remember a meeting with the Permanent Secretary of the Home Office, who frankly – and not a little ruefully – told me: ‘Whenever we want to get the public to think something is a good policy, all we have to do is put the prefix “Australian-style” in front of it.
