Bonkers barmy Green loonies will destroy Britain with open borders

As Polanski hits #2 in the polls, it's time to examine his party's plans more deeply

The Green Party has rapidly grown its support since Zack Polanski was elected leader in September 2025, with some pollsters placing the party above the Liberal Democrats, the Conservatives, and even the Labour Party (although rarely all three together). The party has seen their membership soar to over 225,000 members, making them the third largest party by membership size. The Greens were also bolstered by the election of Hannah Spencer in the Gorton and Denton by-election, where she secured 40.7% of the vote, landing the Greens their fifth member of Parliament.

As the Greens become more popular, raising the prospect that they may well be involved in a future government, they are rightly coming under increased scrutiny. The Financial Times has questioned their economic, defence and drug policies, whilst GB News has highlighted some of their wackier suggestions, such as requiring all dog owners to acquire a licence. Pollsters like YouGov are probing the public on Green policies, including reducing the speed limit on motorways to 55mph (which 69% oppose, including 62% of Green voters). For a party with so much momentum, you’d think there would be more eagerness to tout their plans for government, especially if they believe them to be popular with the public, yet Polanski continues to favour vague sentimentalism over concrete commitments — at least, that is, in public.

One area on which the Greens have yet to receive substantial questioning is immigration. This is one of the most important issues for the public at large, according to periodic trackers from YouGov and Ipsos. As we enter the warmer months, we are likely to see small boat crossings surge and the salience of this issue rise further. Across the three manifestos, migration, immigration, and asylum receive very little attention, beyond vague platitudes like ending the hostile environment, opening safe and legal routes and processing asylum claims more quickly. Given that the party has made a name for itself for taking bold, left-wing positions in contrast to Keir Starmer’s Labour, it seems strange that such a significant issue is left untreated. Dig a little deeper, however, and answers do avail themselves. The Green Party operates a separate website where they list their Refugee and Asylum Policy and Migration Policy, which, as the website notes, were agreed at conference in October 2021 and Spring 2023. Both these pages offer substantially more details about what the Green Party would do if they got into power.

A quick note before we begin exploring these proposals: you will see various references to Universal Basic Income (UBI) throughout quotations from the document. The Greens have declared an intention to phase in UBI, but details are as yet unclear. Without doubt, it would be set at least at the level of Universal Credit, including the £40pw increase the Greens propose, which would put it at £600 per month. Given that UBI typically intends to replace other benefits, we can assume that the housing supplement would also be included, bringing it up to as much as £1500 per month. As the name implies, this would be a universal entitlement, and would not be means tested.

Refugee & Asylum Policy

It is very unfortunate that in this country right-wing media play into popular racism and xenophobia by suggesting that those seeking asylum are not genuine or are abusing our hospitality, and that right-wing governments therefore seek popular approval by making it as hard as possible to gain protection.

The naivety of these opening lines sets the tone for the rest of the document, which makes no attempt to reckon with the possibility that not everyone, everywhere, is purely motivated. It is worth noting that Home Office intelligence estimates that people smugglers charge anywhere between £15,000 and £35,000 per illegal migrant, a sum on the upper end comparable with a down payment on a flat in London — suggesting many migrants have an easier time saving money than many British grads. Downtrodden indeed.

Categories of eligibility

RA 102. The Green Party will extend the applicable definition of a refugee to include those forced to leave their homes by reason of “external aggression, occupation, foreign domination or events seriously disturbing public order” (Convention of the Organisation of African Unity 1969), and affirms that global heating and environmental catastrophe are included under the term “events seriously disturbing public order”.

The current definition of a refugee, as laid out in the Refugee Convention, focuses on a person’s risk of persecution by their own government. That naturally limits eligibility, on the assumption that it is the responsibility of the British state to look after foreigners only if their own state actively does the opposite. This loosening of the rules would make eligible anyone fleeing conflict — including most of the two million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip, as well as millions more in Myanmar, Sudan, Congo, Somalia, etc. — immediately eligible. Estimates suggest that upwards of twenty million a year are currently displaced as a result of climatic events, with up to 1.2 billion affected by 2050 (although those estimates are wildly speculative to say the least).

Arriving in Britain

RA 403. The Department of Migration will deploy no physical or administrative barriers to prevent or deter those wishing to enter the UK to claim protection.

RA 404. The Department of Migration will announce its intent to establish, in consultation with other countries, a system whereby it will be possible for those requiring it to obtain at UK embassies abroad, or online, a visa for the sole purpose of entering the UK to make a claim for asylum or protection, and to remain until their case is decided.

RA 405. Penalties imposed on commercial carriers for transporting undocumented migrants will be abolished.

Taken together, these measures mean that literally anybody in the world will be able to come to Britain without any barriers, claim asylum, and remain in the country at least until their claim is rejected. Currently, it takes more than a year on average to receive an initial decision, and around three quarters of rejected claims are appealed, adding another forty weeks to the process. Even setting aside the Green Party’s proposed complications of this process, the increase in claims would extend the backlog to a degree which is impossible to forecast, but would surely at least double average resolution periods. It is by no means implausible, then, that this policy would result in a universal de facto right to live in Britain for at least five years.

Deciding on your claim

RA 103. Humanitarian Protection will be given to those who meet the above criteria but do not fall within the definition of a refugee as given in the UN Convention, and to all those persecuted on the grounds of any characteristic protected in this country under the Equality Act 2010, such as LGBT people.

RA 501. A neutral approach will be adopted when interviewing applicants: i.e. interviews will not be conducted from the perspective of disbelieving the applicant, and what the applicant says will be believed in the absence of contrary evidence. The object will be to establish the reasonable likelihood that the applicant requires protection. No applicant will be discriminated against in any way. All interviews will be recorded. The recording will be carried out as a video for safeguarding purposes, and the applicant will be provided with a copy of what is said, and of the video if they have the necessary equipment. Applicants will be given the opportunity to add to, or correct, anything said in their interview.

The UK asylum system already has one of the highest grant rates in Europe. Approximately half of applications are successful at initial decision, and half of rejections are overturned at appeal. Even those who are ultimately denied may be given discretionary leave by the Home Office.

Defaulting to believing applicants’ claims will, of course, increase this further. It will also create further incentive for applicants to destroy evidence (such as their passport and other documents). More importantly, and especially in the light of tightened protections on the basis of sexuality, many forms of eligibility are fundamentally unprovable. There is no way to disprove an applicants’ claims about their sexuality, if their assertion that they are a sexual minority is simply to be taken for granted.

Life in the UK

What will life in Britain look like for prospective ‘new Brits’ awaiting asylum decisions?

RA 601. All applicants will be provided with accommodation and financial support, as required, from the date of their application. Financial support will be at the level of Universal Basic Income if it is in force, or at a similar level if not (adjusted if utilities and taxes are included with accommodation). Applicants will be able to access the same range of services as someone granted leave to remain.

RA 703. The category “No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF)” will be abolished.

RA 602. Families seeking protection will be accommodated in a house or flat with exclusive use and without overcrowding. Single applicants may be accommodated in houses of multiple occupation but they will each have their own room. Characteristics of the individual will be used to determine the groupings within shared accommodation, and for safeguarding purposes LGBTQIA+ people will not be asked to share accommodation with others. Accommodation will not be provided in places not generally considered appropriate for civilian habitation (decommissioned prisons, military camps, ships etc.), nor in houses deemed unfit for human habitation, nor in accommodation designated exclusively for asylum seekers. Provision will depend on availability and expense, but the clustering of asylum seekers in particular areas will be avoided.

RA 604. All applicants will be provided with free access to all NHS facilities. That provision will remain as long as they are in the UK, even if their case is rejected. A dedicated mental health provision for those seeking protection will be established, and its services will be available to any applicant from the start of the process.

Honestly, it’s hard to know how to respond to this, other than to point and laugh. It reads like a parody of British immigration policy: open the borders to anyone, and give them access to every benefit (PIP, child benefit, social housing, the NHS, etc.) without charge, from day one — plus a universal basic income. This wouldn’t just be a huge financial cost to the taxpayer: it would also place extreme strain on already limited resources, such as housing, which cannot be quickly expanded. The Greens would devote even more social houses and private rented accommodation to those claiming asylum. And of course, any migrant could claim to be ‘LGBTQIA+’ and, rather than being housed with others, would get their own private accommodation, creating more incentives to lie.

RA 606. All applicants of working age will be allowed to take up employment, with no restriction as to occupation.

But with those benefits, why would you even bother?

If you’re accepted

RA 700. Applicants whose case is accepted will be granted indefinite leave to remain. They will be eligible to apply for citizenship after a period of 5 years’ residency.

At this point, ILR will be a mostly cosmetic status given the abolition of limitations on other visa statuses, but there is still something offensive about the idea of giving formal permanent residency so freely. It is worth noting that refugee status lasts for five years under current rules. At the end of this period, those with refugee status can apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain for free. The regular cost for ILR is £3,226 per person. Refugees also don’t need to demonstrate English language ability or pass the Life in the UK test, whereas migrants who arrive legally must do both.

RA 701. A settlement grant will be made to those granted protection to allow them to purchase essentials to establish a home. Assistance will be offered in the practical aspects of resettlement. They will be allowed to remain in their accommodation for up to six months.

Just in case you hadn’t managed to save up enough for some new pyjamas, a TV, and a hot tub with your UBI whilst waiting for approval, the government will give you an additional cash grant to set up your new home once your approval has been granted. Isn’t that nice!

If you’re rejected

RA 505. An applicant whose case is rejected will be granted the right to appeal to a tribunal or higher court as appropriate.

RA 506. Applicants will be permitted to submit further evidence at any point, including after a finally rejected application. Such submissions may be made by post, or, at the applicant’s choice, in person.

Claimants can already appeal their initial rejection, and currently around 75% of them do. For the Greens, however, this is not enough — rejected claimants will be given seemingly infinite opportunities to make new submissions. It is not clear, however, why they would even bother, because…

RA 507. Immigration detention will be abolished. An applicant who has been found not to need protection and who has exhausted all appeal rights and the six months’ grace provided for in RA 607, and who then remains in the country, will be treated as a migrant not seeking asylum or protection.

RA 508. There will be no requirement for any applicant, or any person whose case has been refused, to report regularly to the Department of Migration.

If, despite these proposed reforms making it almost impossible, your claim is rejected, no need to fear. You will not be deported — you will just be treated as a normal economic migrant (more on what that means later). Even if the government wanted to deport you, it would be essentially impossible to do so, with the abolition of any detention or monitoring procedures allowing migrants to disappear into the general population. You can even keep your free housing for six months, or more:

RA 607. Accommodation and support when an applicant has had their case rejected with all appeal rights exhausted will be continued for a further period of 6 months to allow them either to gather material for a further submission or to make preparations for their future.

RA 608. No one will be left in destitution, no matter what the state of the relevant application.

Defending justice

The above list could easily have been twice as long — there are various other routes for family reunification, chain migration, community sponsorship, as well as plentiful offers of extra help and benefits to migrants of all types. However, with these policies alone, we have established that every single person in the world will be allowed to come to Britain and immediately claim UBI, which they will keep even if they are rejected. In fact, if I were a Chinese tourist looking to spend some time in Britain, I would forego a visitor visa entirely and simply apply for asylum, withdrawing my claim after finishing my trip (and collecting UBI for the duration).

One might ask how people will possibly accept such an insane system. Well, the Green party has an answer to that:

RA 407. The Department of Migration will work with the Department of Education and the government information service to disseminate knowledge of the situations from which those seeking asylum and resettling refugees are fleeing, and the need for and moral obligation of asylum and humanitarian protection.

Government propaganda will be delivered to adults and children alike, assuring them that the millions pouring across the border every year are fleeing awful circumstances, and that denying them would be genocide. A perfect solution!

Migration policy

Given that we’ve already established open borders through Green Party asylum policy, assessing the impact of other migration policies seems something of a moot point. Nevertheless, there are a few things worth commenting on which truly highlight the insanity of the party which could plausibly form the official opposition in the next Parliament if current trends continue.

MG100. The Green Party wants to see a world without borders, until this happens the Green Party will implement a fair and humane system of managed immigration where people can move if they wish to do so.

Of course, when ‘a fair and humane system of managed immigration’ means open borders with some additional complexity, one may as well just drop the act. In the background policy paper, the Greens note that border controls are ‘relatively modern inventions’. While this may be true to some extent (restrictions date back to at least 1793 in Britain, and the modern system of general regulation came into force in 1905) the Greens don’t examine any of the economic, technological, security, social, or cultural reasons for why every country on earth has had some form of border control and immigration restrictions for at least one hundred years.

Entry rules

MG301. All visas can be applied for on entry, while in the UK, or before entry.

MG400. All arrivals to the UK without a visa will be granted a visitor visa for a period of three months regardless of where they have come from unless standard exclusions apply. They will then have this period of time to apply for a different visa if they so wish.

MG310. Visa applications from specific individuals may be rejected on grounds of public safety. These grounds are restricted to serious crime and threats to national security.

In the light of MG301 and MG400, MG310 provides little reassurance, as applicants would already be in the UK without any detention or tracking measures. It is therefore unclear how they would be found by authorities upon rejection, or even whether they would be deported could they be.

Eligibility requirements

MG305. Minimum income requirements will be removed from all applications as well as any benefits from having a higher income.

MG306. Language requirements will be removed from all applications. Free language classes will be made available to promote and encourage integration.

MG507. Workers with a confirmed contract of employment satisfying UK employment laws will automatically receive a visa to work unless standard exclusions apply.

One of the key drivers of the Boriswave was the relaxation of salary, language, and skills thresholds. If you limit the issuance of work visas purely to a valid contract of employment, this will presumably include sponsoring migrants on zero-hours contracts. In the policy paper, the Greens also suggest abolishing the Immigration Skills Surcharge, which would make it cheaper for more businesses to hire overseas labour. Besides companies like Deliveroo being able to ship in as many workers as they like, there would be nothing preventing immigrant-led companies offering zero-hours contracts to every person in their village looking to move to Britain.

MG509. Visa residents will have the right to bring members of their family to the UK who would normally live with them in their country of origin, or would do so if it were permitted by law or custom.

Of course, it doesn’t much matter how easy it is to bring family members as family members if they can simply come individually with ease, but it is worth noting that this would expand eligibility substantially. In many other cultures, there is a strong desire to bring over not just children or spouses, but also friends, neighbours, cousins, parents, etc. This policy would turbo-charge family reunification and chain migration. In the policy paper, the Greens cite examples of migrants who have tried (and thankfully failed) to bring their parents and grandparents over. The paper also describes sham marriages as a ‘moral panic’ and downplay spousal visa fraud because TV shows like Married at First Sight exist — I only wish I were joking.

Even with de facto open borders, measures such as this will still increase flows, because they make it more obvious to more people that coming to Britain is an option. A great deal of migration decisions are far less calculated than many assume. Many people move thousands of miles from home, essentially on a whim, having been told by someone in their community — often someone who has already made the same move — that there are opportunities.

Benefits and entitlements

MG500. For the purposes of this policy, visa residents are defined as migrants who have a non-visitor visa, do not have settled status and are not British citizens.

MG502. Access to the NHS will be free and comprehensive for all visa residents.

MG503. Any No Recourse to Public Funds conditions will be abolished and visa residents will have access to welfare benefits or Universal Basic Income.

Again, there is little to do here but laugh. Every migrant, on every visa, would have immediate access to every benefit to which British citizens are entitled.

The policy paper notes that the Greens would abolish the Immigration Health Surcharge (IHS), a fee that migrants not working in the NHS must pay before their visa is issued. The Greens cite that this raised £297.7m in 2018/19, even though the policy paper was published in 2023. This is a pre-Boriswave figure. In 2024/25, the IHS raised £2.4 billion, it raised £1.7bn in 2023/24. Even at the time of publication, the 2021/22 figure was available, showing £1.4bn had been raised that year. Perhaps the use of such an outdated figure is intentionally misleading. Regardless, there is no attempt to explain how such an expense can be afforded.

MG601. Residents with settled status have the same access to benefits, student finance, and the NHS as British Citizens.

MG602. Children of residents with settled status will have access to student finance for their higher education and will not be liable for international fees.

These measures are already in place, but it’s nice to know the Greens don’t intend to take away any of the current handouts migrants receive, even as they offer so many more on top.

Citizenship and participation

MG501. All visa residents will have the right to vote in all elections and referendums.

It is already a disgrace that we allow millions of non-citizens from Commonwealth countries the ability to vote, including those on temporary visas. Expanding this further would make British citizenship administratively meaningless.

MG504. All Visa Residents will be able to apply for settled status after five years.

MG603. Any resident with settled status can apply for citizenship if they wish to do so.

As is already the case — although, currently, time spent on a study visa doesn’t count towards the 5-year ILR route, though it does count towards the 10-year ILR route. Allowing a 5-year route to ILR across all visa categories would enable hundreds of thousands more to settle in Britain each year. In the policy paper, the Greens make it clear the purpose of this policy is to enable more migrants on study visas to settle in Britain.

MG701. All children born in the UK are automatically British Citizens.

The British Nationality Act 1981 abolished birthright citizenship. Reintroducing it would fundamentally change the definition of British nationality — but of course, that is precisely what the Greens are looking to do.

MG702. A Green Party led Government will commit to tackling statelessness and will ensure that once citizenship is granted it cannot be removed.

The British Nationality Act 1981 allows the Home Secretary to revoke citizenship when it was obtained via fraud, or when the removal of citizenship is conducive to the public good. It was on this basis that the citizenship of Shamima Begum was removed. By removing the ability to strip citizenship, which has been in place since at least 1915, the Greens would deny the British government any ability to redress fraud or to punish terrorists or perpetrators of organised crime.

According to a House of Commons research briefing: ‘Many of those deprived of their citizenship on “public good” grounds are thought to be Muslims. Most fraud cases involve naturalised Albanians.’ —SN06820, p10

Illegal migrants

It’s not clear how any migrants could realistically end up without a visa of some kind, given the laxity of the rules laid out so far. But in the rare cases that they do, will they finally be deported?

MG800. Undocumented migrants will be given free advice and support to help them to regularise their status without penalty for being undocumented.

MG801. Undocumented migrants who have been in the UK for at least five years will be invited to apply for settled status unless the standard exclusions apply.

One wonders why the Green Party bothered to write thousands of words on migration policy, when they end the document with this. Given that there will be no barrier to entering the country illegally, and that illegal immigrants will be allowed to apply for ILR after five years, there really is no restriction whatsoever on who can settle in Britain.

This would also mean amnesty for the entire existing illegal migrant population. Estimates of their numbers are by definition hard to gauge, with the last official estimate being produced in 2005, which suggested an illegal population between 310,000 and 570,000. A more recent estimate from Pew Research places the figure in 2017 at between 700,000 and 900,000. Since 2018, we’ve seen nearly 200,000 small boat arrivals, and since 2021 the Home office has stopped conducting exit checks. There are almost certainly more than a million people in Britain who either arrived illegally or have overstayed their visa. Of course, that is just a drop in the bucket compared to the numbers that will be coming in every year under the Greens’ proposals.

Conclusions

It should be clear from this exploration that the Greens are not a serious party. Obviously, they are insane, but, beyond that, their refusal to consider any practical restriction on their moral impulses is disrespectful and negligent towards the people they wish to govern. It is not nice or cuddly to suggest policies which would lead to fiscal collapse because they sound virtuous to the mind of a particularly naïve child.

It is impossible to say just how many people would come to Britain under these plans each year. Would it be ten million? Twenty? One hundred? The Telegraph’s claim that it would be a mere 4.4 million (only barely more than the rate of peak Boriswave) is surely an underestimate. There are certainly billions who would take the offer. If the tidal wave ever abated, it would only be because word had reached Lagos that London has become just as much of a festering shanty-town, only with worse weather.

One other realisation dawns looking at these policies. They read like a left-wing wish list, often overlapping with various redundancies. In fact, that is precisely what they are. Green Party policies are agreed at conference, and are binding on the party. Were the Greens in government, they would, in theory, be committed to following the whims of their membership, regardless of the basis of their mandate. As well as being democratically illegitimate, this is not a functional way of building an agenda for government. Your Party has largely collapsed as a result of the left’s obsession with procedural governance, which eschews any principles of organisational management in favour of ideological shibboleths about internal power structures. The Greens are, structurally, no different — but their higher average human capital obscures this dysfunctionality. We should be deeply interested in how the Green party operates, if they are to play a role in future British governments. A party that is run in this manner has no business doing so.

They say sunlight is the best disinfectant, and there is reason to believe the Green coalition is showing signs of fraying. It is incumbent on all political parties to confront the Greens with their own policies, as Reform UK have started doing. If the Greens are confident, they should welcome their policies reaching the limelight and coming under scrutiny. The fact that they host their own immigration plans on an external website, even excluding them from their 2024 manifesto, suggests a very different reaction.

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This article was written by Charlie Cole, a Pimlico Journal contributor. Have a pitch? Send it to submissions@pimlicojournal.co.uk.

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