It is great to be here.

We are less than three weeks away from the general election.      

And this is your chance to ask me questions about our plans for the future of the country.

Before that let me set out what we want to do.

The mission of my government will be to build a future that works for working people, with a recovery that reaches every part of our country.

That is why we will reward everyone’s hard work with an £8 minimum wage.

It is why we will ban exploitative zero hours contracts.

It is why we will guarantee apprenticeships for our young people.

Cut the tuition fee to £6000.

And why we’ve got a rescue plan for our NHS.

And as we seek to build that future: one issue that working people need the next government to deal with is immigration.

And I want to talk to you today about the next Labour government’s approach.

Let me be clear.

Labour got it wrong in the past.

We have listened.

We have learned.

And we have changed.

It is not prejudiced to be concerned about immigration.

As Prime Minister, I will always address concerns not ignore them.

As Prime Minister, I will always put working families first.

And that’s why we’ll have proper controls and rules.

Because at the heart of our programme in 2015 is working people

We believe it is only when working people succeed that Britain succeeds.

So today, I want to set out our better plan for immigration.

Immigration is in fact the start of my story.

My parents came to Britain to flee the horrors of the Nazis.

They found a country that welcomed them and offered them the opportunity to build a new life.

To start a family.

To work hard and make a contribution.

I wouldn’t be standing here today, asking you to elect me your Prime Minister, if it wasn’t for the generosity of this great country.

A country that succeeds because of its tolerance, its decency and its diversity.

A country where people of different faiths and backgrounds rub shoulders together and build a common life.

Where we are always stronger when we draw on the widest range of talents, perspectives and cultures.

I know immigration can benefit our country.

But I also know for that to happen, there have to be proper controls on immigration.

We have got to have the right rules in place.

And with a Labour government we will.

And to do that we will be guided by five important principles.
Securing our borders.

Restoring the principle that you contribute before you claim.

Achieving integration in our communities.

Ending the undercutting of local workers through the exploitation of migrant workers.

And rebuilding trust by only making promises we can keep and proposing solutions that will work.

I’ve been very clear about the mistakes the last Labour government has made.

We were wrong not to ensure there were maximum transitional controls when new countries joined the European Union in 2004.

And the reason we were wrong is that working people were seeing dramatic changes in their communities that were not planned or properly prepared for.

We won’t make that mistake in future.

In fact, we want to see longer transitional controls when new countries join the EU.

But the change we need goes beyond our relationship with the European Union.

We need a system of controls.

We will cap the number of workers from outside the EU.

We will secure our borders with the recruitment of an additional 1,000 border staff.

Paid for by a small charge on some visitors to the UK, like they have in the United States.

We will introduce a new system to count people in and out of the country, so we clamp down on illegal immigration, including those who overstay their visas.

We will introduce stronger controls to prevent those who have committed serious crimes coming here.

And deport those who commit crimes while they are here.

Of course, we should also welcome those who can make a contribution.

Like university students, who bring in billions.

And as we police these rules we will do so in a humane way.

We will uphold our international obligations to offer a refuge to people fleeing persecution.

And we will reform the system of immigration detention so, for example, we end indefinite detention and end detention for those who have been the victims of sexual abuse or trafficking.

Britain is a tolerant country and I want to keep it that way.

And controlling immigration is not just about controlling how many people enter the country.

It’s about what happens when people come here.

Especially to our sense of community and the common life we live together.

So the next principle is restoring the traditional value of contribution.

It’s the principle that our welfare state was founded on.

A badge of citizenship.

An ideal the British people rightly value: paying in before you take out.

Fair rules means that entitlement to benefits needs to be earned.

You should contribute before you claim.

So, with Labour, when people come here they won’t be able to claim benefits for at least two years.

And we’ll stop child benefit and child tax credits being claimed for children living in other countries.

I am determined to put fairness and contribution back at the heart of the system.

And how we live together stretches beyond contribution.

It is about the bonds we build between each other.

Our communities are changing fast.

But we don’t cope with change by closing our doors to each other and living our lives in separate worlds.

Instead we must find a way to live together across communities.

A Britain where people of all backgrounds, all cultures, all religions, can practise their own faiths but also come together to forge a common identity.

But we can only build this shared society if we speak the same language.

It is what my Mum and Dad did when they came to this country.

It is why I believe a simple principle:

Everyone in Britain should know how to speak English.

Sometimes, we’ve been too timid about this.

But it is something we should expect from everyone who comes here.

And it is especially important that people who work in public services in public facing roles should be required to speak English.

And nowhere is that more true than in our NHS.

We all know the crucial contribution that people from overseas play in our NHS.

Doctors, paramedics, social workers, nurses.

Bringing specialist skills that we need.

I will never demean or devalue their contribution to our country.

But it is vital that people who come to fulfil these roles don’t just have the right medical skills but can communicate with those for whom they care.

So in the future all healthcare professionals will be required to speak English to a sufficient standard so they can care effectively for patients.

And we will legislate to give all the healthcare regulators - not just some - clear powers to enforce this rule.

So strong borders, contribution and building a common life: all of these matter.

But there is something else important too.

Something other parties will never understand.

It is about our economy and the world of work.

Look at what’s happened to our economy over the years.

So many of the secure jobs that once defined the places people live have gone.

The mills and mines, the factories and family farms that once provided dependable work for whole communities are often no longer there.

Now far too much of our economy is defined by its insecurity.

Low pay.

Low skills.

Temporary jobs.

Poor prospects.

Zero hours contracts.

This is the story of our economy for so many people in this country.

And it is in these low skill, insecure workplaces that migrant labour is often concentrated.

And sometimes these are places where the normal rules just don’t seem to apply.

Too often this anything-goes economy damages the interests of the working people of the country.

People live in the most appalling, cramped conditions, sometimes sleeping 20 to a house.

People being paid well below the minimum wage.

People having their wages stolen.

This exploitation of the worst kind isn’t just bad for those people directly affected, it drives down standards for everybody else.

Undercutting the wages and conditions of local workers.

Because if there are people willing to work in these type of conditions it inevitably drives down standards of work for everyone.

It makes it harder for responsible employers to do the right thing.

And pay decent wages.

It is an epidemic of exploitation.

And we will end it.

We’ll increase the fines for firms who don’t pay the minimum wage and undercut wages.

We’ll stop the unscrupulous practice of using agency workers to undercut permanent employees.

We’ll ban recruitment agencies from only hiring workers from overseas.

And we’ll make it a criminal offence to undercut pay or conditions of local workers by exploiting migrant workers.

And to enforce all this we will establish a new enforcement unit based in the Home Office.

This team of at least 100 officers who will have one overriding duty:

To stop the abuse that makes the working families of Britain poorer.

The Labour Party will fight exploitation wherever we find it.

This new unit will have the powers and funding it needs to increase the prosecutions and convictions of Britain’s worst employers:

Those who exploit workers and drag down the wages of everyone else.

So we will take measures to secure our borders, restore contribution, achieve integration and tackle undercutting.

But we also need to rebuild trust.

The promises politicians make during election campaigns matter.

When they aren’t kept, they don’t just erode people’s faith in politicians, they erode what we can achieve together.

David Cameron made a promise before the last election.

“No ifs, no buts”, he said.

“We make a promise to the British people that we will reduce net migration to the level that it was at in the early 1990s”.

He told us he would get net migration down to the tens of thousands, not the hundreds of thousands.

This was part of his contract with the country.

He even invited us to kick him out of office in five years if he didn’t deliver.

But net migration rose to 298,000 last year.

That’s a rise of 50,000 since 2010.

It’s the highest it’s been for ten years.

He’s not even close.

The Conservatives’ target is in tatters.

And just as I reject false promises so I reject false solutions.

Nigel Farage wants us to leave the European Union.

I say it would be a disaster for jobs, families and businesses.

And I will never seek to exploit people’s legitimate concerns.

I don’t want HIV sufferers attacked on national television.

I don’t want to pretend that we should get rid of our racial equality laws.

And I don’t want a country where we seek to divide.

That’s not who I am.

And that’s not what I offer.

On immigration, UKIP are the party of fear.

The Tories are the party of failure.

But Labour will be the party of fair controls.

On borders.

On benefits.
In our public services.

And in the workplace.

Britain needs a Prime Minister who will only make promises on immigration that they can keep.

Real promises that will make a real difference.

A plan that starts with strong borders; so people have confidence that we control who comes into the country.

A plan that’s founded on fair rules, where wages can’t be undercut and benefits must be earned.

A plan that’s based on the right values.

This is our better plan for immigration.

Based on Labour values.

British values.

Because Britain is a tolerant country.

An optimistic country.

But it must be a country with rules that help working people.

A country that believes our best days lie ahead.

A country that knows if working people succeed, Britain will succeed.

A country that knows with a better plan we can have a better future.