Manchester United owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has apologised after his remarks about the UK being ‘colonised by immigrants’ sparked a predictable furore of confected outrage. The Prime Minister seized on Ratcliffe’s comments as a convenient distraction from his own current political problems. So too did the beleaguered Chancellor Rachel Reeves. Everyone from Manchester mayor Andy Burnham to the BBC and the Guardian gleefully joined in the condemnation. The Football Association said it was launching an investigation into whether Ratcliffe had brought the game into disrepute.
You can always trust the FA to leap on any passing woke bandwagon. No doubt there’ll be a minute’s silence and Taking The Knee all round this weekend. One Left-wing pundit on Sky News, which broke the story, deliberately missed the point and wondered if Ratcliffe would now tell his foreign Man Utd football stars they were no longer welcome.
Inevitably, in this age of the ubiquitous knee-jerk social media pile-on, some of the reaction was hysterical. But hurling ignorant abuse is about the level of debate to which we have descended. Talking about ‘colonisation’ was always going to be a red rag to the Left-wing bull. Colonisation is right up there with ‘racism’ in the Left’s lexicon of hate, regularly used to falsely portray Britain’s proud history as one of global pillage and slavery. It was recently rolled out to justify Starmer’s shameful decision to give away the Chagos Islands to Mauritius and by extension, the Chinese.
To be fair, it has to be admitted that those who accused Ratcliffe of hypocrisy over immigration had a point. He is after all a multi-billionaire who has relocated to Monaco to avoid British taxes. But with the caveats and the noisy, self-serving virtue-signalling out of the way, it is worth paying attention to what Ratcliffe actually had to say, no matter how clumsily he may have said it. He is after all a spectacularly successful businessman who has created tens of thousands of jobs in Britain and poured billions of pounds into the Exchequer. The main thrust of his remarks was aimed at the state of the economy.
First, though, let’s consider his apology. He actually said he was sorry if his choice of words ‘offended some people’ but the not the substance. There were millions more people who will have agreed with every word. First out of the blocks were Reform leader Nigel Farage and ex-Reform, now an independent, MP Rupert Lowe, himself a former chairman of Southampton FC. Farage tweeted: ‘Britain has undergone unprecedented mass immigration that has changed the character of many areas.’ Lowe said: ‘Ratcliffe is right. And I respect him for having the balls to say it’, adding: ‘[The UK] has been colonised by immigrants. That’s just a fact. No point pussyfooting around it.’
Ratcliffe may have mangled his figures but the underlying facts are indisputable. If he’d have said the population has risen by 12 million since the year 2000, not 2020, he’d have been bang on the money. And they are just those who turn up in the official statistics. As long as 25 years ago, then Commissioner of the Met, Captain (now Lord) Beaujolais, told me there were between 250,000 and 300,000 foreign nationals in London about whom the police knew nothing.
A quarter of a century later, how many migrants are living here illegally? Your guess is as good as mine.
That’s before you get to the tens of thousands of small boat arrivals who arrive here illegally every year and are given food, lodging, free health care and pocket money by the Government and face less than zero chance of ever being deported.
No one with eyes in their head can deny that mass migration has changed the face of parts of Britain irrevocably. For example, look no further than my colleague Robert Hardman’s brilliant despatch from Birmingham this week. When I worked in Brum in the late Seventies the city was genuinely multi-cultural. Today, in areas like Sparkhill, it’s monocultural – almost overwhelmingly Muslim.
So, too, are many of the old mill towns in the North of England, where elections for councils and Parliament are being fought over Gaza, not potholes and the state of the pavements.
Farage and Lowe are right. Many areas of our towns and cities have been colonised by migrants. It’s how the Pakistani rape gangs were able to get away with it for so long. The police were afraid of upsetting the local ‘community’.
A few years back, my old friend Trevor (Now Sir Trevor) Phillips, then head of the Equalities Commission, warned that Britain was sleepwalking towards segregation. Surkeir himself said we were becoming an ‘island of strangers’ before bottling it and doing another of his world-famous U-turns.
Ratcliffe also said migrants were costing the country too much money. Well, last October it was reported that 1.9 million foreign nationals were claiming a variety of benefits, along with 1.49 million people born abroad who are now British citizens. As of last November, that number was rising by 500 a day.
This week we also learned that migrants make up one in ten of all new GP patient registrations, at a time when the health service is stretched to breaking point and burning through billions of pounds every week. Look, this has always been about numbers. Nobody is arguing about legal, controlled migration and granting visas to skilled workers such as medical professionals and, yes, Premier League footballers. The real problem is the vast influx of low-skilled and unskilled workers, bringing with them dependants who put further strain on the benefits and welfare system.
Yes, we are grateful to migrants who come here to work in the care system and elsewhere. But there are only here because millions of our fellow citizens are claiming out of work benefits for pretend illnesses. Ratcliffe’s statistics may have been muddled but his analysis was spot on. We can’t go on importing migrants to do jobs British citizens refuse or consider themselves too ‘disabled’ to do.
Nine million people of working age are now considered ‘economically inactive’– 6.5 million on out-of-work benefits, the rest not even looking for work. It’s the road to ruin. Yet Starmer has run away from reforming welfare and in the last Budget, Reeves ladled even more billions at the occupants of Benefits Street, while yet again clobbering the productive, wealth-generating sector.
If the monarchy is to survive, there is only one solution: King Charles must go. That might sound excessive, unprecedented even. But the current crisis engulfing the Crown is grave indeed. Andrew's arrest — the police, unannounced, rousting the disgraced former prince from his bed at 8am — is surely not the end of this scandal. It may only be the beginning. The revelations to come, the sordidness, the potential criminality — and who else might be implicated — pose an existential threat to the future of the British Royal Family.
It's what William is said to have been warning about, to nearly no avail. Convincing his father to strip Andrew of his titles, which was formally announced on October 30, 2025, took an ultimatum. 'William absolutely loathes Andrew and has for years,' a well-placed source says. If the Prince of Wales had his way, 'he would have Andrew banished,' the source continued. 'He told his father: "It's either him or me." So, Charles had to step up and ice Andrew out.'
To a point.
The King has still allowed his brother to live, rent-free, on the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk — which is where he was at the time of his arrest. And all in the wake of newly released emails from Andrew's equally greedy, disgusting ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, calling the dead pedophile Jeffrey Epstein 'the brother I have always wished for'. Along with other pleas to 'just marry me'. Or sharing the grubby detail that her daughter Eugenie was off on a 'shagging weekend'.
Does Sarah seem ashamed in the wake of her ex-husband's arrest? No. Not in the least. She is, by all reports and in typical fashion, most worried about where she'll find her next sugar daddy to bankroll her utterly pointless lifestyle. 'Fergie has behaved like an absolute tramp throughout,' my source says. 'She's taken thousands from Epstein. She's up to her totters in it.' As for Andrew, this royal insider says the photo of the former prince taken Thursday night, looking traumatized after he was released from police custody, was a very real reading of his emotional state. 'Andrew is on watch,' the source says. 'He's an international pariah, and this [arrest] is just the trade envoy stuff.'
And so the next question, the question that must be asked: What did the King know, and when did he know it?
If the monarchy is to survive, there is only one solution: King Charles must go. That might sound excessive, unprecedented even. But the current crisis engulfing the Crown is grave indeed. Andrew's arrest — the police, unannounced, rousting the disgraced former prince from his bed at 8am — is surely not the end of this scandal. It may only be the beginning. The revelations to come, the sordidness, the potential criminality — and who else might be implicated — pose an existential threat to the future of the British Royal Family.
It's what William is said to have been warning about, to nearly no avail. Convincing his father to strip Andrew of his titles, which was formally announced on October 30, 2025, took an ultimatum. 'William absolutely loathes Andrew and has for years,' a well-placed source says. If the Prince of Wales had his way, 'he would have Andrew banished,' the source continued. 'He told his father: "It's either him or me." So, Charles had to step up and ice Andrew out.'
To a point.
The King has still allowed his brother to live, rent-free, on the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk — which is where he was at the time of his arrest. And all in the wake of newly released emails from Andrew's equally greedy, disgusting ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, calling the dead pedophile Jeffrey Epstein 'the brother I have always wished for'. Along with other pleas to 'just marry me'. Or sharing the grubby detail that her daughter Eugenie was off on a 'shagging weekend'.
Does Sarah seem ashamed in the wake of her ex-husband's arrest? No. Not in the least. She is, by all reports and in typical fashion, most worried about where she'll find her next sugar daddy to bankroll her utterly pointless lifestyle. 'Fergie has behaved like an absolute tramp throughout,' my source says. 'She's taken thousands from Epstein. She's up to her totters in it.' As for Andrew, this royal insider says the photo of the former prince taken Thursday night, looking traumatized after he was released from police custody, was a very real reading of his emotional state. 'Andrew is on watch,' the source says. 'He's an international pariah, and this [arrest] is just the trade envoy stuff.'
And so the next question, the question that must be asked: What did the King know, and when did he know it?
King Charles was warned as long ago as 2019 that the Royal Family’s name was being ‘abused’ by Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s business associations, The Mail on Sunday can reveal. In a bombshell email, a whistleblower told the Palace that the former Duke had secret financial links to controversial millionaire financier David Rowland, who was abusing his royal links. Messages seen by this newspaper also appear to show that Andrew – who was sensationally arrested on Thursday over suspicions of misconduct in public office – allowed Mr Rowland to effectively join in with his official duties.
The cache of emails threaten to draw Charles further into the crisis, triggered by Andrew’s links to Jeffrey Epstein, and allegations he passed potentially confidential and sensitive documents to the convicted paedophile. Andrew once told Epstein that Mr Rowland was his ‘trusted money man’. The banker and his son Jonathan joined Andrew on trips he made in his official capacity as a taxpayer-funded trade envoy between 2001 and 2011, visiting places such as China and former Soviet states. Over a period of several years, Andrew repeatedly alerted Mr Rowland to business opportunities arising from his work. Mr Rowland once gave Andrew’s ex-wife Sarah Ferguson £40,000 to help clear debts and, in 2017, paid off a £1.5million loan for Andrew.
In August 2019, a whistleblower who had detailed knowledge of Andrew’s business dealings with Mr Rowland sent an email to Charles, then Prince of Wales, via the royal lawyers Farrer & Co, warning of ‘David Rowland’s abuse of the Royal Family’. It said: ‘HRH the Duke of York’s actions suggest that his Royal Highness considers his relationship with David Rowland more important than that of his family.’ The whistleblower then sent a second email to Mr Rowland himself, copying in Clive Alderton, Charles’s private secretary, and Mark Bridges, the late Queen’s solicitor at Farrer & Co. That message said: ‘The evidence provided unequivocally proves that you have abused the Royal Family’s name.’ The email further alleged that Mr Rowland ‘paid HRH The Duke of York to procure a Luxembourg Banking Licence’ for his private bank, Banque Havilland, and included what were claimed to be Andrew’s bank account details.
The whistleblower email forms part of a raft of new MoS revelations about Andrew’s business activities, including:
- Andrew told Jonathan Rowland he’d ‘had a very supportive chat’ with PM David Cameron and Labour leader Ed Miliband, apparently at Prince William’s wedding in April 2011, when questions were being raised over his trade envoy position following this newspaper’s publication of the now infamous photograph of him clutching 17-year-old Virginia Giuffre.
- Andrew secretly used an official trade mission to help strike a multi-million-pound deal for his business associates to sell oil to China, with the hope of making ‘tons of money’ with Epstein.
- A British ambassador warned the Government more than two decades ago that Andrew’s behaviour as trade envoy was damaging his country and the Royal Family.
The MoS can also reveal that Andrew invited Jonathan Rowland to a meeting at Buckingham Palace attended by the UK’s ambassador to Montenegro to help boost the Rowlands’ business ambitions. The ambassador put government staff at the Rowlands’ disposal, while Andrew gave David Rowland his schedule for a trip to Montenegro as UK trade envoy. Emails show that a British diplomat in Moscow told the Rowlands the Palace event was ‘a great success’ and connected them with the British embassy in the Serbian capital Belgrade, which covered Montenegro at the time. ‘If there is anything the commercial team… can do to help, please do not hesitate to contact’ them, he wrote, copying in the relevant official.
On Saturday, MPs called for the police to study the evidence acquired by the MoS. Andrew has consistently denied any wrongdoing. A Buckingham Palace source said that given the ongoing police investigation into Andrew it would not be possible to give any comment on the whistleblower’s email, adding that any relevant material in the possession of the MoS should be shared with the appropriate authorities. There are growing calls for the Government to introduce legislation to remove Andrew from the line of succession, where he remains eighth in line to the throne. Defence minister Luke Pollard said stripping him of his right to succession was the ‘right thing to do’, regardless of the outcome of the police investigation.
Gloria Allred, a lawyer who has represented 27 Epstein victims, urged the King and the Prince and Princess of Wales to give statements to police.
Channel boat migrants are being waved on to British soil without strict security checks when they disembark, a Daily Mail investigation can reveal. In a glaring lapse, hundreds of migrants arriving illegally on the Kent coast from France in the past month have been whisked through less than half an hour after stepping ashore. Our investigation has found a lack of rigorous vetting by Border Force and the intelligence services which is designed to weed out suspected foreign criminals or potential terrorists coming in on trafficking gangs' boats.
The Home Office has temporarily switched the Kent arrival port for boat migrants from Dover to Ramsgate, 20 miles away, opening what whistleblowers have suggested is a 'dangerous' gap in security. The Daily Mail timed the movement of migrants who arrived in Ramsgate after being picked up mid-Channel by the Border Force vessels Typhoon, Defender and Volunteer since the beginning of February. From there, hired coaches take them three miles to a processing centre in Manston.
On Tuesday, the time between their disembarkation from Typhoon to arrival at the Manston camp was 38 minutes. The migrants were at the port, where they handed in their lifejackets, for 27 minutes before being let into the UK. They were given fresh clothes, medical wipes, a check for weaponry with a hand scanner and were then packed off to Manston.
On February 9, Defender brought in migrants at 9.50am. At 10.20am they left the port, arriving 13 minutes later at Manston processing centre – a total of 43 minutes. The Volunteer berthed later that day, with migrants disembarking at 10.58am, before leaving on a coach 24 minutes later and arriving in Manston at 11.42am – 44 minutes in total. The new arrivals at the camp, almost all illegal entrants, stay for up to three days for fingerprinting, identification and security interviews. The interviews, we were told by those recently arrived, can last for just 45 minutes. They are then sent to migrant hotels or Home Office properties around the country.
Manston is said by the Home Office to be a secure camp. But a whistleblower warned: 'We know of cases where migrants have disappeared, been picked up by relatives and even visited the local McDonald's. It is not a prison, nor meant to be.' By contrast, those at Dover got dry clothes, were screened for illnesses and faced questions about their identity, according to the Home Office – a process that could take each contingent hours before they were taken to Manston. It was designed to root out those with knives, guns, criminal records, or links to terrorism.
A whistleblower said: 'Many were undocumented, completely anonymous. They often throw away their passports in France or during their journey. No one really knows who they are or what their intentions might be. It is potentially hazardous.'
