Zia Yusuf - Home Affairs Spokesperson | Reform Watch
Profile and accountability tracker for Zia Yusuf, Home Affairs Spokesperson. null.
Role: Home Affairs Spokesperson
Recorded incidents (showing 11-20 of 25)
Zia Yusuf links illegal working to harm to 'British youngsters' and vows jail terms
Category: xenophobia
On 6 August 2026 in London, Zia Yusuf, Reform UK’s spokesman for home affairs, held a press conference and said corporate CEOs had been "making a fortune by hiring illegal workers" and were "undermining British youngsters". He described young people as the "biggest victims" of illegal working and said Reform UK would jail company directors and impose heavy financial penalties on firms employing illegal workers. The remarks formed part of a wider Reform UK policy announcement that proposed prison sentences of up to five years for company directors and fines equivalent to 10% of global turnover, alongside a central prosecution fund for local authorities. Yusuf framed the measures as intended to "stand up for British workers" and presented them as the party’s policy position on illegal working.
Zia Yusuf proposes paid tip line for illegal working, using phrase Turkish barbers tip line
Category: xenophobia
Zia Yusuf, Reform UK's home affairs spokesman, unveiled a policy proposal to pay members of the public financial rewards for tip-offs that lead to successful prosecutions of High Street shops employing illegal workers, using the phrase Turkish barbers tip line to describe the scheme. He said rewards would be paid from larger fines imposed on firms and that the party would fine large firms up to 10% of their global revenues and make chief executives and directors personally and criminally liable. The Home Office said it was already increasing penalties for companies hiring illegal workers and a departmental source called some of Reform's proposals empty posturing. Deliveroo said illegal working should be addressed and outlined measures it already takes; Reform presented the measures as pledges it would introduce if it entered government and Yusuf remains the party's home affairs spokesman.
Zia Yusuf vows 'harshest penalties' for employers of illegal migrants
Category: inflammatory language
On 5 August 2026 Zia Yusuf made a public statement in which he attacked employers of illegal workers, saying that under Reform "Britain will have the harshest penalties in the world" for those employing illegal migrants. He presented the measure as a response to what he described as the undercutting of British workers. He accused Labour and the Conservatives of having "made Britain the softest-touch country in the world for illegal migrants to undercut British workers". No immediate response from Reform UK or other parties was announced and no disciplinary action has been reported.
Zia Yusuf proposes navy to force small boats back to France
Category: xenophobia
On 3 August 2026 Zia Yusuf, Reform UK home affairs spokesman, said on the Today programme that his party would order the Royal Navy to force small boats carrying migrants back to France. He described the plan as "the largest military operation in the English Channel since World War Two". Yusuf said the plan would be published in full at a party conference and that it had been endorsed by former senior members of the armed forces. He accepted it could provoke a diplomatic dispute with France; international conventions on the sea allow states to rescue people in danger but do not permit taking people to another country without that country's consent, a legal issue the proposal would have to address.
Zia Yusuf accused rivals of "incitement" after Ann Widdecombe's murder while defending his own language
Category: inflammatory language
At a press conference on 15 July 2026, following the murder of Reform politician Ann Widdecombe, Yusuf argued that the political climate treated Reform UK as "a threat to be urgently stopped" and that a narrative "so relentless it constitutes incitement" could move some people to lethal violence. He cited old posts by Labour figures, including a 2010 joke by Jess Phillips about Widdecombe on Strictly Come Dancing. Asked about his own record of calling opponents traitors and saying the Conservatives deserved extinction, he said there was a clear difference between that and comparing Reform to Nazis or fascists. He also suggested that a £5m gift from Christopher Harborne was largely intended to fund Nigel Farage's security.
Sources: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/reform-zia-yusuf-farage-ann-widdecombe-death-b3015430.html https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/reforms-zia-yusuf-widdecombe-democracy-5HjdddF_2/
Zia Yusuf demanded a total visa ban on Sudanese nationals after a Belfast knife attack
Category: xenophobia
Following a knife attack in Belfast in June 2026, after which a Sudanese man with leave to remain was arrested and charged, Yusuf announced that a Reform government would impose a total ban on visas for people from Sudan. He said "Prime Minister Farage will reverse the invasion and ensure you no longer have to endure the horrors seen in Belfast today." The pledge was made while the case was still at charge stage and applied a blanket penalty to every national of a country in the middle of a civil war, including people with no connection to the attack. It followed a pattern of policy announcements framed around individual criminal cases.
Sources: https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/2215465/reform-uk-pledges-total-ban https://spectator.com/article/sudanese-knife-attack-suspect-had-leave-to-remain/
Zia Yusuf repeatedly branded Conservative and Labour politicians "traitors"
Category: inflammatory language
Through 2026 Yusuf used the language of treachery against elected opponents, describing Conservative and Labour politicians who he said had created "the burning injustice of modern Britain" as traitors to their country, and warning that "a reckoning is coming." He applied the term to named individuals as well as to parties. The pattern was documented by HuffPost, the Spectator and others, and drew criticism that a senior figure in a party seeking government was normalising the idea that political opponents are enemies of the nation. Yusuf did not withdraw the language and continued to defend it when challenged.
Sources: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/zia-yusuf-tory-labour-traitors_uk_6a1c1a6fe4b005ae41836729 https://spectator.com/article/can-zia-yusuf-really-complain-about-inflammatory-language/ https://inews.co.uk/opinion/true-face-reform-snarling-dangerous-4688973
Zia Yusuf vows review and deportation of 'hundreds of thousands' of asylum claimants
Category: inflammatory language
On 20 April 2026 Reform UK home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf said on X that the party would review all successful asylum claims from the past five years and revoke the status of anyone found to have entered illegally or overstayed a visa, with those people to be deported if Reform wins the next general election. The party estimated about 400,000 people would be "in scope" of the review and said it would aim to deport large numbers each year, including a pledge to operate multiple removal flights daily. The announcement formed part of a broader Reform policy package that includes leaving the European Convention on Human Rights and a target figure of deporting 188,000 illegal migrants a year. Shadow home secretary Chris Philp and Liberal Democrat immigration spokesman Will Forster criticised the plan as impractical; the measures are a party pledge and would require implementation if elected, with operational detail not specified by Yusuf.
Zia Yusuf attacked the BBC when pressed on Reform's candidate vetting failures
Category: inappropriate behaviour
Interviewed on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg on 29 March 2026, Yusuf was questioned about dozens of Reform UK candidates lost to scandal, among them a Senedd candidate photographed appearing to make a Nazi salute and a candidate who had called Humza Yousaf an "Islamist moron". He called the incidents abhorrent but said that even with a success rate of 99.9 per cent a handful would slip through. He then turned on the broadcaster, accusing the BBC of giving Reform's mishaps vastly disproportionate coverage while ignoring comparable problems in other parties. The exchange followed repeated assurances from Reform that its vetting had been professionalised under his chairmanship.
Sources: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/zia-yusuf-slams-bbc-amid-questions-over-reform-candidate-scandals_uk_69c90090e4b06be0a3089250 https://nation.cymru/news/reform-incidents-abhorrent-says-zia-yusuf-after-welsh-candidate-quit-over-nazi-salute-image/ https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/humza-yousaf-nazi-bbc-reform-uk-scottish-b1276887.html
Zia Yusuf blamed "low-trust societies" for immigration and pledged to block churches becoming mosques
Category: discriminatory remark
In interviews and a speech in February 2026, shortly after being made Reform UK's home affairs spokesman, Yusuf said Britain's high-trust society had been eroded "quite rapidly" because of "the vast numbers of people who have arrived over a short period of time from low-trust societies", adding that "some people might wince at that phrase, but it's just obviously true." He also pledged that a Reform government would use listing and planning powers to stop churches being converted into mosques, framing this as restoring Britain's Christian heritage, and backed reweighting the Prevent programme so that the bulk of its funding targets Islamist terrorism. Yusuf is himself a practising Muslim, and the remarks drew criticism for attributing dishonesty to whole nationalities.
Sources: https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/zia-yusuf-interview-christianity-reform-p6bmz0mth https://www.christiantoday.com/news/zia-yusuf-says-reform-would-protect-the-uk-s-christian-heritage