British workers would see their wages rise under Reform’s plan to end firms’ decades-long reliance on cheap foreign labour, Nigel Farage vowed yesterday.

Under his ‘very bold’ plan to restrict legal migration, the party leader said if he becomes Prime Minister foreign nationals will no longer be able to come over for low-paid jobs leaving locals ‘priced out’.

He also outlined proposals to cut benefits for all migrants with settled status. In order to claim benefits they would need to have British citizenship.

Mr Farage said a Reform government would force UK firms in sectors reliant on overseas staff to apply for new Acute Skills Shortage Visas and pay a levy to train Britons to do the jobs in future.

The proposals form part of Mr Farage’s plan to stop some 800,000 recent arrivals from settling by scrapping the immigration status of Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR), which allows people who’ve worked in Britain for more than five years to stay and claim benefits.

He said savings to the taxpayer would be more than his party’s estimate of £230billion in the coming decades, despite critics saying the figure was unreliable – and the think-tank that came up with it saying it should no longer be used.

Mr Farage and key ally Zia Yusuf set themselves on a collision course with Brussels by pledging to stop European citizens who have settled here claiming benefits, though added little detail as to how they’d make that happen.

They faced an angry response from trade union leaders and opposition parties who warned that their plans would split families and cost vital sectors, such as the NHS, thousands of workers.

Challenged at a press conference today whether telling people here legally to leave clashed with the British sense of fair play, Mr Farage replied that he was talking about ‘fair play’ for British people.

Mr Farage vowed: ‘This is the end of endless cheap foreign labour, and an attempt to get young British people trained up to do the right jobs for the right pay.’

Asked if British workers would do these jobs, particularly with many on sickness benefits, Mr Farage said: ‘One thing that will encourage people to work, of course, is the fact that we’re saying that average wages under these plans will go up.’

Reform’s plan, which follows its separate policy to deport 600,000 foreign criminals and Channel migrants over five years, was praised by some campaign groups.

Migration Watch chairman Alp Mehmet said: ‘Immigration is now the sole driver of our massive and rapid population growth. 

‘It simply must be checked if serious tensions are to be averted.’

William Yarwood, media campaign manager of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: ‘The size and scope of our welfare system and universal healthcare system has made Britain a magnet for those looking to live a life funded by taxpayers.’

But Rachel Harrison, National Secretary of the GMB union, said public service such as the NHS were reliant on migrant workers and without them ‘our care and health sectors would collapse’.

General Secretary of the Royal College of Nursing Nicola Ranger said: ‘Threatening to sack thousands of migrant nursing staff is abhorrent beyond words.’

Dr Ben Brindle, researcher at the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford, said: ‘Around 430,000 held indefinite leave to remain at the end of 2024. 

‘Removing this status, which has been considered secure under successive governments, would be exceptionally unusual.’

Matthew Wills, partner at law firm Laura Devine Immigration, added: ‘Rescinding the status of migrants who have entirely legitimately secured an indefinite UK immigration status fundamentally undermines the rule of law.’

Reform predicted that some 800,000 people who arrived under the last Tory government will become eligible for ILR by the end of the decade and that half of them will never work – yet they will all have ‘full access to our bloated welfare state for life’. 

It said that rescinding existing awards of ILR would save £234billion. 

But the Centre for Policy Studies think-tank, which calculated the ‘ballpark’ figure, said it shouldn’t be used as the Office for Budget Responsibility changed the definitions on which it was based. 

Reform also clarified that it would not scrap the ‘settled status’ given to four million EU citizens after Brexit, although it would seek to stop them claiming benefits.

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey warned that Reform’s plan risked a Windrush-style scandal.

He told GB News: ‘He has not realised that lots of these people have made their lives here, contributing to businesses, to the health service.’

Labour party chairman Anna Turley said: ‘Their policy was in pieces before their press conference even started when they relied on discredited numbers.’