Reform UK has accused the BBC of a ‘serious failure of impartiality’ after Zia Yusuf lodged a formal complaint alleging that Question Time ‘stacked’ its audience with small boat migrants.
Yusuf, the party’s policy chief, said the broadcaster had created a situation he likened to asking ‘convicted burglars to debate law and order’ after he was quizzed on-air by two men who admitted entering Britain illegally.
Nigel Farage called the episode a ‘set-up’, claiming the BBC had given a national platform to people ‘the majority of the country want to keep out’.
Posting his complaint letter on X, Yusuf wrote: ‘I have lodged a complaint with the BBC, asking why they chose to platform men who had entered the United Kingdom illegally, giving them a national stage to lecture the British public on immigration policy.’
In the letter – dated 5 December and sent to the BBC Complaints Team – Yusuf accuses the corporation of breaching its duty of impartiality on the Question Time: Immigration Special, calling it ‘a serious failure of editorial judgment and audience selection’.
He says the BBC ‘deliberately chose to platform individuals who had entered the United Kingdom illegally’, including one contributor who ‘openly stated that his asylum application had been rejected in six countries before being accepted here’.
Another, he writes, ‘read directly from his phone a prepared list of arguments against leaving the ECHR, even referencing the Northern Ireland Settlement,’ which he describes as ‘extraordinary’ and ‘inappropriate for a licence fee-funded broadcaster’.
Yusuf says Reform has become used to ‘unrepresentative audiences’, but insists this episode ‘surpassed anything we have seen before.’
He argues that at a time when ‘over 70% of the British public believe immigration levels are too high’, the BBC instead centred voices of illegal entrants, creating a dynamic ‘totally detached from public opinion.’
He continues: ‘Should we now expect the BBC to invite tax evaders to comment on the Budget? Would it stack an audience with convicted burglars to discuss law-and-order policy?’
Yusuf accuses the programme of framing the national immigration debate as one ‘between those who came to the country illegally, and British citizens’, calling this a ‘breach of common sense and public trust.’
He also disputes a claim made on-air by Labour immigration minister Mike Tapp, who said 50,000 of the 70,000 illegal migrants who had arrived since the change of government had already been deported.
Yusuf says the true figure is around 2,700, adding: ‘It is troubling that such an evidently misleading claim was neither challenged nor contextualised by the BBC.’
He notes this is not the first time he has encountered questionable fact-checking by the broadcaster, recalling a previous episode in which presenter Fiona Bruce ‘had to fact check her own ‘fact check’ at the end of the programme and apologise.’
Yusuf concludes that an episode billed as an ‘Immigration Special’ should have delivered a representative audience and balanced debate but instead offered a platform ‘designed to marginalise mainstream opinion while elevating fringe voices.’
One of the two men told the immigration special hosted by Fiona Bruce that his asylum application had been rejected by six other countries before he came into Britain from Afghanistan.
Both are understood to have been granted refugee status so have a legal right to be in the country.
Reform leader Nigel Farage, who has appeared on Question Time himself repeatedly in recent years, said it had been ‘utterly discredited’ by a stunt designed to ‘get the great British public to sympathise with them’.
‘The BBC sunk to new depths last night on their Question Time show, their flagship politics show for over four decades, where they had two audience members who’d illegally come into Britain by boat,’ he added.
Mr Yusuf said that before his appearance, Twitter users had joked that the BBC would probably invite small boat migrants on to the programme.
‘Then, staggeringly, that happened. There were two illegal migrants who’d come originally by small boat. The BBC were very open about that,’ he told GB News.
Following the programme on Thursday night, Mr Yusuf tweeted: ‘It is a scandal that licence fee money is being paid to bring to air an ‘immigration special’ where people who literally broke into this country are getting to air their views.
‘What’s next? On Budget day, is the BBC going to bring us the viewpoint of tax evaders? I don’t know where we go from here.’
He said one of the migrants had asked him a question which involved reading a statement from his smartphone about how important it was that the UK stayed in the ECHR.
Mr Yusuf was asked by presenter Fiona Bruce whether he would deport a man who had said he had come from Afghanistan.
The migrant, Ashraf, revealed that his asylum application had been rejected by six other countries before he came into Britain.
He said he had lodged unsuccessful asylum claims in Turkey, Macedonia, Serbia, Romania, Austria and Germany.
‘These countries just rejected me and didn’t accept me,’ he said.
Asked why most small boat migrants are men coming without their families, the Afghan said: ‘Everyone knows my country is not safe for us, we have a war of 15 years.
‘We are living in a war, because of that we come here and I just want to live.’
In response, Mr Yusuf said: ‘I don’t know enough about that individual story but in terms of broad strokes let me be clear, if you are entering a warzone, it’s generally men first and if you are fleeing a warzone it’s generally women and children first and the vast majority of people coming to this country via the English channel illegally are men. That is a statistical fact.
‘And when people talk about language, I don’t know what language they are objecting to. I’m dealing with statistics, I’m dealing with data and I think that’s a sensible way to formulate policy and I think we should use language clearly and accurately.’
Asked about Reform’s policy to deport all illegal migrants within five years, Mr Yusuf added: ‘If you are in this country illegally, let me be crystal clear, if Nigel Farage is the next Prime Minister, you will be deported back to the country from which you came.
‘Over 170,000 people have arrived in this country illegally since 2018, most of that was done by the Tories sadly, and that is more people than arrived on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day.
‘I have used the word invasion before and people might object to that term but the dictionary definition of the word is an unwanted incursion into a space of land and I don’t know what else to describe it as – 170,000 people.
‘Countries they are coming from include Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, not countries which have the British people at heart.’
Mr Yusuf also sparred with an Iranian migrant, who criticised the suggestion of leaving the ECHR.
‘I just want to clear up that leaving the convention [ECHR] doesn’t just affect migrants,’ the Iranian said.
‘It would give ordinary people one less court to protect their rights.
‘The Government would risk the peace settlement in Northern Ireland and damage our security cooperation.’
Asked if he would be happy to return to Iran if it became safe again, he said: ‘There’s two points. If physically Iran is safe, if there is a regime change, okay that is safe for people like me to go back to Iran.
‘But the second thing is for me, I have a four-month-old daughter, she is born here and growing up here, learning English, learning how to read and write English.
‘She won’t know how to read and write Farsi or even speak Farsi.’
Asked if he would prefer to stay in the UK, he said: ‘Yeah, let’s say after five years, the Government, from Zia – who came originally from a migrant family, can’t tell me to go back to my own country, what will happen to my daughter?’
Mr Yusuf replied: ‘My parents came here legally, they did not come here illegally.
‘There is a clear dividing line in British politics. If you want to vote for a party who will prioritise foreign nationals who came here illegally or do you want to vote for a party that is going to prioritise British citizens who work hard, set their alarm clocks in the evening before going to bed, and toil to pay tax.
‘Do you know how much money the British taxpayer has had to pay for Universal Credit payment alone for foreign nationals last year? That was £10billion. British taxpayers will be spending half the forecast defence budget on Universal Credit alone for foreign nation.’
He later added: ‘How on earth it can be deemed appropriate that people who broke into this country illegally should have a seat at the table?’
Discussing the show, he accused the broadcaster of ‘rigging’ the audience in Dover – which he said would likely fall to Reform if an election was held tomorrow.
It is also the main destination of many of the small boat migrants who cross the Channel.
A BBC spokesman said: ‘As immigration continues to be a primary concern for people in the UK, Question Time held a special episode in Dover with panellists from across the political spectrum and a local audience with a range of views and experiences.
‘Over 20 audience members asked questions and contributed to the debate – including two people with direct experience of the asylum system in the UK who have been granted refugee status.’
‘All the parties represented on the panel were told the day before the show that there would be people in the audience who had been through the asylum system.’
Read more
- Has the BBC crossed the line by seating ‘illegal’ migrants as audience members in its politically charged immigration special?
- Do extreme views overshadow meaningful debate on immigration in Channel 4’s latest divisive documentary?
- Is BBC snubbing Nigel Farage’s fiery speeches in their coverage of refugee policies and Reform UK’s rise?
- Did the BBC’s immigration documentary hide the realities, pushing a narrative of undue hostility and exaggerated issues?
