The prime minister has also refused to say whether he would resign if he loses the election (Picture: PA)

The Prime Minister has been accused of lying to the public over his pledge to cut immigration.

Boris Johnson has set out plans to introduce an Australian-style points-based immigration system, which would place ‘no limits on highly educated and award-winning workers, investors or entrepreneurs coming to Britain after Brexit’.

Mr Johnson also claims the new system would fast-track and offer reduced fees to doctors, nurses or social care workers who want to come to work in the NHS.

The Prime Minister, in an interview with Sky News’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme, said he could guarantee ‘numbers will come down’ as part of the ‘controlled’ measures.




However, shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said Mr Johnson’s claims were ‘misleading’.

Mr Ashworth also argued that the Tories would have ‘no democratic control’ over the immigration numbers, due to plans to set-up an independent committee to oversee the points-system implementation.

The Prime Minister joined some of his cabinet members today at the Conservative Campaign Headquarters Call Centre, London (Picture: PA)

Labour’s Mr Ashworth told Sky News: ‘He said the committee will be independent in the same way as the Bank of England is independent, so he is misleading people when he says he is bringing immigration down because there will be no democratic control.

‘There will be no accountability over any decision that any immigration minister makes, because it will be handed over to a statutory independent committee – so again Boris Johnson is lying to the British people.’

Mr Ashworth went on to say that without free movement, the NHS and social care sector ‘literally could not survive’, if ‘we don’t continue to recruit internationally’.

Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage, also appeared on the Sophy Ridge programme, where he accused the prime minister of having ‘always been very soft’ on immigration.

Shadow Health Secretary Jonathan Ashworth accused the prime minister of misleading the public (Picture: AFP)

Mr Johnson also went on to suggest there could still be a domestic population boom, if the electorate put him back into Downing Street and allow him to push through his Brexit deal.

He told the Sunday Times: ‘Cupid’s darts will fly once we get Brexit done. Romance will bloom across the whole nation.

‘There was one after the Olympics, as I correctly prophesied in a speech in 2012. It was quite amazing. There was a big baby boom.’

The paper notes that, while 2012 did see the biggest baby boom for 40 years, the cause was said to be the release of the erotic novel Fifty Shades Of Grey, rather than the Olympics.

During his appearance on Sky News, Mr Johnson also declined to answer three times when asked whether he would resign if he loses the election.

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