A clip of Keir Starmer and Nigel Farage having a cosy conversation in the Commons has resurfaced again on social media:

Remember, they only pretend to be on opposing sides when they think the cameras are rolling. pic.twitter.com/qb7CGNPa37

— StarmerOut (@ForeverScept) November 11, 2025

Can you imagine Jeremy Corbyn having such a chat with Reform leader Farage? Well, that’s because Corbyn takes issues such as NHS privatisation and anti-immigrant scapegoating seriously, whereas Starmer is actually on a similar political page as the Reform leader.

Starmer rolling out the red carpet for Farage

This was all too clear in the 2024 general election. Starmer halted the campaign of Black Labour candidate Jovan Owusu-Nepaul. This was in Clacton, the seat Farage contested and then won.

Farage had previously tried and failed to become an MP seven times. It was only when Labour ensured he’d gain a seat that he won. That said, Clacton was formerly held by UKIP MP Douglas Carswell, so was a good bet for Farage. But Starmer having Owusu-Nepaul essentially stand aside, shows his true colours.

Same page: anti-immigration

Since entering government, Starmer has not been challenging Farage. Instead, he’s been legitimising the Reform leader’s anti-immigrant rhetoric, conceding to him on the issue. But to manipulate the Labour membership into voting for him as leader, Starmer previously said:

We welcome migrants. We don’t scapegoat them. Low wages, poor housing, poor public services are not the fault of migrants and people who’ve come here. They’re political failure… So we have to make the case for the benefits of migration.

Now the Labour leader talks about Britain becoming an “island of strangers” because of Black and brown people, echoing Tory Enoch Powell.

Farage openly welcomed Starmer’s rhetoric:

We at Reform, a party that is alive and kicking, very much enjoyed your speech on Monday. You seem to be learning a great deal from us.

Same page: NHS privatisation

In January 2025, Farage told LBC that he was “open to anything” when it comes to NHS privatisation. And he previously told a UKIP meeting in East Sussex that:

I think we’re going to have to think about healthcare very, very differently. I think we are going to have to move to an insurance-based system of healthcare.

Frankly, I would feel more comfortable that my money would return value if I was able to do that through the market place of an insurance company than just us trustingly giving £100bn a year to central government and expecting them to organise the healthcare service from cradle to grave for us.

Meanwhile, Starmer has been increasing NHS privatisation by up to 71% in some areas by the backdoor. Instead of outright charging people at the point of use, he has increased private provision of the NHS by an average of 10% throughout the country in his first year alone. This means private corporations make profit from the NHS budget, where the public are effectively charged more.

Starmer and Farage are politically aligned. And one can be sure the Labour leader would prefer a Farage premiership over a Polanski one.

Featured image via the Canary

By James Wright

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