O SOBADO DE LISBOA AINDA VAI CRESCER COM OS RETORNADOS AFRICANOS NACIONALIZADOS...AQUI PAGA-SE LOGO QUE CÁ METEM UM PÉZINHO...

Ed Miliband: we will introduce tougher rules on benefits for new migrants
Labour leader says right to welfare ‘must be earned’ and admits that the recent success of Ukip is a real danger

The Observer, Saturday 11 October 2014 21.30 BST
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Ed Miliband has pledged a raft of hard-headed measures to ensure that migrants 'earn the right' to state benefits. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA
Ed Miliband has moved to contain rising panic over Ukip’s growing threat to Labour by pledging a raft of hard-headed measures to ensure that migrants “earn the right” to state benefits and face stiff English language tests before taking up jobs.

Ahead of what promises to be a tense meeting of his parliamentary party in the Commons on Monday, the Labour leader accepts, in an article for the Observer, that Ukip’s successes in recent elections now represent a real danger that Labour cannot ignore.

Miliband stands accused by some in his party of failing to do enough to counter Ukip and of allowing Nigel Farage to amass support in Labour heartlands as well as Tory areas by exploiting worries over immigration.

Concern that Ukip could wipe Labour out in many northern seats next May reached new heights on Friday after the anti-EU party failed by only 617 votes to oust Labour in its previously safe seat of Heywood and Middleton in Greater Manchester. While the Conservatives suffered the humiliation of losing to Ukip in Clacton – where the Tory defector Douglas Carswell became Ukip’s first MP – senior Labour figures say the party has been caught unawares by Ukip, having focused on the cost of living crisis and the NHS, with immigration a lower priority.

One key figure said: “We have had no real response to Ukip, who are now our main opposition in large parts of the north. We just assumed Ukip was the Tories’ problem. The worry is that it is a bush fire spreading everywhere.”

In his first detailed response since Ukip’s byelection surges, Miliband insists that while he will never seek to imitate Farage’s party, Labour has to do more and comprehend why people feel so abandoned that they are turning to Ukip in anger. “We can only do so if we understand many of the people turning to Ukip because of disappointment with Conservative and [past] Labour governments,” he says.

While he claims that his core message that the economic recovery is not benefiting most people has resonance, he accepts that “all this does not automatically translate into support for the Labour party”. He adds that if Labour is to win next May “there is much work to be done”.

Making clear Labour will announce tough new immigration policies in coming weeks, Miliband says that rules limiting access to benefits until migrants have contributed to the state will be based on the principles of “contribution, responsibility, fairness”. As well as stronger border controls and laws to stop “exploitation that has undermined wages of local workers”, Labour will commit to “reforms to ensure those who come here speak English and earn the right to any benefit entitlements”.

A MAIORIA DO 45000 DOUTORADOS SENTADOS NA MESA DO ORÇAMENTO INCLUINDO EM ESPECIAL OS INVESTIGADORES DAS MIGRAÇÕES VÃO ESFREGAR AS MÃOS DE CONTENTES POR TEREM A SUA MÃO DE OBRA DE VOLTA.SÃO "PORTUGUESES" JÁ ESTÁ ASSEGURADO...