So said former Labour Home Office Minister Fiona Mactaggart at a Labour Progress Conference. This was reported to me by an Immigration Officer and I was so astounded that I did a Google search and found it on BBC online. According to Ms MacTaggart:
"One of the reasons immigration officers are shits is actually because some people cheat and they decide everyone is like that".
If this were a stand-alone comment, this would be bad enough. Yet Ms Mactaggart was backed up by Labour MEP Claude Moraes, who also rounded on the immigration officers, complaining about their 'professional standards'.
It seems astonishing that senior Labour figures can trash immigration officers, when it is the Government who caused the immigration shambles in the first place. Immigration officers - under-resourced and working long hours - do a remarkable job, against the odds. No wonder so many of the profession are up in arms at the former Minister's comments.
If anything, this is a fascinating example of how Labour tries to turn its own failings in government into an attack on the professions. Who can forget Tony Blair's playing to the gallery at Labour conference about the 'forces of conservatism' allegedly preventing reform - when in fact the biggest roadblock of reform of welfare and the public services was Gordon Brown himself? It also shows how Labour, piece by piece are losing touch with the huge coalition of voters who supported the party in 1997. It indicates an arrogance of a decade in power and a 'we are the masters now' mentality. To label an essential profession - in part responsible for the safety and security of the country as sh*ts - without a moment's hesitation - shows just how far lost in their ivory towers, senior Labour figures have become.
