PM Cameron ‘sent Clegg to talk to May’

POLITICS: Former Prime Minister David Cameron used to send Sir Nick Clegg to tell then-Home Secretary Theresa May to “stop being so extreme on immigration” during the coalition government, a senior peer claimed yesterday.

FORMER PRIME Minister David Cameron used to send Sir Nick Clegg to tell then-Home Secretary Theresa May to “stop being so extreme on immigration” during the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government, a senior peer claimed yesterday.

Amid ongoing anger over the Windrush generation scandal, Liberal Democrat Lords leader Lord Newby, who was the party’s Chief Whip for peers during the coalition Government years, told

The Yorkshire Post that Mr Cameron asked his deputy Sir Nick to intervene “because he couldn’t stop” Mrs May.

His comments came after former civil service head Lord Kerslake said coalition Ministers were so unhappy with the immigration policies brought in by Mrs May when she was Home Secretary they made comparisons with Nazi Germany.

Labour has blamed the Prime Minister’s “hostile environment” tightening of immigration rules in 2014 for the Windrush scandal, in which Commonwealth citizens who were invited to Britain to help rebuild it after the Second World War are wrongly having their status questioned.

Lord Newby, who grew up in Rothwell, West Yorkshire, claimed that during the coalition years Mr Cameron and his Chancellor George Osborne were opposed to some of Mrs May’s immigration policies.

But The Yorkshire Post understands it was often Sir Nick who had to negotiate with Mrs May over controversial proposals.

In an interview with this newspaper, Lord Newby said: “The phrase Nazi Germany isn’t one I remember. But you remember those appalling (‘Go Home’) vans that we had to put a stop to.

“And more generally during the coalition it was Theresa May not just against the Lib Dems but Theresa May against her own Prime Minister and Chancellor.

“And Nick Clegg used to be sent round by David Cameron to intercede with Theresa May to stop her being so extreme on immigration because he couldn’t stop her.”

Lord Newby claimed the entire coalition Cabinet agreed that students should not count towards the Tories’ target of reducing net migration to the “tens of thousands”, but Mrs May refused.

“Everybody, bar her, wanted to exclude them but she wouldn’t; she’s very, very stubborn,” he said.

On Wednesday, Lord Kerslake said the 2014 Immigration Act had been a “very contested piece of legislation” across Whitehall.

“It was highly contested and there were some who saw it, I shan’t name them, as almost reminiscent of Nazi Germany in the way it’s working,” he told BBC Newsnight.

Asked if he was referring to people in the civil service, Lord Kerslake said: “No, some in the Ministers were deeply unhappy.”

But Environment Secretary Michael Gove yesterday told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “I have never heard anyone make that comparison before Lord Kerslake did.”

Downing Street said the changes had been thoroughly debated by MPs at the time.

“It is important that we have an immigration system which is robust and in which people can have faith,” the Prime Minister’s official spokesman said.

A spokesman for Mr Cameron did not reply to a request for comment from The Yorkshire Post.

Clegg used to be send round by Cameron to intercede with May. Lord Newby, Liberal Democrat leader in the House of Lords.