Reform to create agency like ICE and new detention centres for migrants

Reform UK has announced it would create an ICE-style agency to oversee the deportation of illegal migrants if it were in government.

Zia Yusuf, Reform's new home affairs spokesperson, said on Monday morning that a Reform government would establish a UK Deportation Command.

Its task would be to deliver "Operation Restoring Justice" to fulfil the party's plan of deporting 600,000 illegal migrants.

He also announced an overhaul of the Prevent counter-extremism programme to target "Islamist extremism", and said a Reform government would ban groups it deemed extremist. 

Yusuf further said that new laws would stop the "incendiary" act of churches being converted into mosques.

"I’m the son of immigrants myself," Yusuf said at a press conference in Dover.

"When my parents came to this country the levels of legal migration were what the levels of illegal migration are today."

He said that "some have already called our plans draconian. Our response: Britain is being invaded."

He added: "Our plan is the only appropriate response to a national security emergency."

Yusuf said Reform would "rapidly build" detention facilities to house 24,000 illegal migrants.

"A Reform government will launch an emergency programme to track down, detain and deport all illegal migrants in the UK," he said. 

'We will defend our culture'

He announced that countries including Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria and Eritrea would have their visa rights denied for refusing to allow their citizens to be returned from Britain.

Calling borders the "guardians of our culture", Yusuf claimed that "untold numbers of people from low-trust cultures with entirely different values have been imported into our country".

He added: "We will defend our culture… we will protect the Christian heritage of Britain. We will end the incendiary practice of converting churches into mosques and other places of worship".

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Yusuf also argued that "Islamist extremism" has been "tolerated out of fear of being called names".

He said Reform would ban the Muslim Brotherhood "as well as any other organisation that promotes extremism in Britain".

Extremism is currently defined by the government as vocal or active opposition to fundamental British values. 

Yusuf announced an "overhaul" of the Prevent policy, saying it was failing to focus on Islamist extremism.

He insisted Prevent "will be laser-focused on one thing: detecting extremists before they can kill British people".

"It will be focused on the actual threats to this country. As such, three-quarters of Prevent’s resources will be deployed to identify and neutralise Islamist extremism in direct proportion to MI5’s caseload."

In August 2024, a United Nations report strongly criticised Prevent, saying it was "particularly concerned about the high number of interventions and referrals of persons belonging to Muslim communities, especially children".

More than 70 percent of Muslims in England and Wales live in "Prevent Priority Areas", compared with around 30 percent of the general population.

A 2023 study by Rights and Security International, based on data from 2015-2019, further found that "people recorded as Asian and cases recorded as ‘Islamist related’ were subject to comparatively greater scrutiny than other ethnic groups and types of concern".

Ties to UAE

Yusuf's speech comes after it was reported last month that the United Arab Emirates (UAE) wanted to engage with Reform over a shared opposition to political Islam.

Middle East Eye reported in January that at a speech at a private party in Dubai, Reform leader Nigel Farage praised the UAE for banning the Muslim Brotherhood and said a Reform government would do the same.

The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Cairo in 1928 and is one of the world's largest and best-known groups espousing political Islam.

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It has long maintained that it is a peaceful organisation that wishes to participate in politics democratically.

But it is considered a major threat by many autocratic governments in the Middle East and North Africa.

This is because, in rare instances in which free elections are held in the region, parties affiliated with the organisation often win outright or form the largest opposition party.

The group is banned in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the UAE.

In January 2025, the UAE labelled eight British organisations as terror groups over alleged links to the Muslim Brotherhood, although none of these organisations is considered to have broken any British laws.

And in 2023, it was revealed that the UAE had paid a private intelligence firm based in Geneva, Alp Services, to smear Britain’s largest Muslim charity, Islamic Relief Worldwide, by seeking to link its officials with the Muslim Brotherhood and violent extremists.