Skip to main content
Starmer promises to close ‘loophole’ allowing Palestinians right to remain under Ukraine scheme
Palestinians walk along a street amid widespread destruction caused by the Israeli military's ground and air offensive against Hamas in Gaza City's Jabaliya refugee camp, February 11, 2025

SIR KEIR STARMER has vowed to close a “loophole” that allowed a Palestinian family to remain in Britain after they applied through a scheme designed for Ukrainian refugees.

The Prime Minister said today that the decision was “wrong,” Parliament should set the rules on immigration and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper was “working on closing this loophole.”

Tory leader Kemi Badenoch raised the case at Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs), urging Sir Keir to appeal against the decision and introduce legislation to “clarify the right to a family life” under article eight of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer departs 10 Downing Street, London, to attend his final scheduled Prime Minister's Questions at the Houses of Parliament, July 15, 2026
Parliament / 15 July 2026
15 July 2026

Meanwhile, incoming PM Andy Burnham dithers over who should be his Chancellor

Palestinians carry sacks of flour unloaded from a humanitarian aid convoy on the outskirts of Beit Lahiya, northern Gaza Strip, August 23, 2025
Features / 28 August 2025
28 August 2025

How can we claim to be human while our countries still support and defend the massacres in Palestine, asks HUGH LANNING

Maysara Adwan, left, mourns as she holds the body of her 11-year-old son, Qais, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike on a school in Gaza that has been used as a shelter, during his burial at Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, Friday, July 25, 2025
Arms Trade / 25 July 2025
25 July 2025

Sir Keir faces backlash for continuing to enable the genocide in Gaza