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Decades-old racism is resurfacing to UK the political arena, which creates very scared, the Prime Minister has stated, cautioning that divisive far-right politics are “dividing the nation”.

Confronting Discriminatory Language and Harmful Politics

Speaking with doctor and media figure Amir Khan, the prime minister accused Nigel Farage’s Reform UK for enabling a return of racist and divisive political discourse “that frankly I thought we had dealt with long ago”.

During the discussion, which aired on ITV’s Lorraine show on Tuesday, Starmer provided his strongest signal that the limit on child benefits would be lifted in the budget later this month.

Promise to Combat Child Poverty

When questioned if he would scrap the limit, which charities have said is the biggest driver of poverty for children in the UK, the Prime Minister said: “I can tell you in no uncertain terms I will strive to lower poverty rates for kids.”

He outlined steps the government has already launched such as free school meals, breakfast clubs, and child care support and emphasized: “Further action is necessary, and I assure you and tell you I am dedicated to cutting child poverty.”

Pressed about if his comments indicated he intended to remove the two-child cap, Starmer stated “I would not say we are going to drive down child poverty if I wasn’t clear that we will be taking various actions to achieve this”.

Clear Signals from Rachel Reeves

Rachel Reeves, gave an equally strong hint on Monday when she told BBC Radio 5 Live how “in the end, no child should suffer because their parents don’t have very much money”.

Government officials are reportedly planning to remove the cap completely, after initially considering phasing it out for bigger households or wealthier families. An economic thinktank has estimated this would cost roughly £3.5 billion in the coming years.

Political Divide and Country’s Revival

During the discussion, the Prime Minister said the ideological split currently in Britain existed between Labour’s “patriotic national renewal” and Reform’s harmful divisiveness and other right-wing groups who were “tearing our country apart”.

“Some of the rhetoric we’re hearing – racist rhetoric, divisive rhetoric – that many assumed had been addressed in the past has reemerged in political debate and it makes people feel deeply afraid,” he said.

“We have to stand up such discrimination, that division, and we have to proudly say that to be British is to have concern for others, is about being fair, is to be tolerant and kindness, which we value deeply.”

Reflecting Concerns from Wes Streeting

Starmer mirrored language expressed by Wes Streeting, who warned recently how an “ugly” racism similar to past decades had become alarmingly frequent again and that NHS staff were facing the worst of this trend.

The health secretary noted incidents of verbal and physical abuse targeting individuals due to race now happened so often that it was now “acceptable to express racism”.

“We’ve got to call time to discrimination in this country and we need to place such harmful attitudes that’s found expression nationally where it belongs and once again create an environment across Britain that rejects racism to hold racist views,” Streeting said.

Defining Choice for the Public

Starmer spoke during a major political gathering in September to outline political battle lines with his political opponents, saying that voters confronted a pivotal moment.

He explained he was involved in a struggle for the nation’s identity, and argued that while voters had “reasonable” concerns about illegal migration, existed “a moral line” that Farage and others had crossed.

Starmer pledged to confront those who argued that people who were not white could not be English or British and that families who had lived in Britain for years must be removed, saying people promoting such views were “an enemy of national renewal”.

“Encouraging racial attacks and hostility, that goes beyond concern: it is illegal. Our political movement values national symbols, yet if they are painted alongside graffiti, targeting a business owner to leave the country, that is not patriotism; that’s racism,” he told supporters.