Reform UK’s Laila Cunningham hit again after former RMT boss Mick Lynch accused her of “profiting from poverty”.

Laila Cunningham clashed with Mick Lynch over immigration and welfare (Picture: Newsnight)
Reform UK’s Laila Cunningham went toe to toe with ex-RMT boss Mick Lynch on Monday’s episode of Newsnight.
Showing on the BBC’s political programme, the London Mayoral candidate received right into a tense conflict with Lynch after he accused her of “isolating folks” and “profiting from poverty” in a very scathing comment.
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Introduced onto the present for a dialogue about immigration and welfare within the UK, Cunningham requested: “Do you imagine within the basic precept that social housing and advantages needs to be for the British folks? Do you imagine that?”
“The British folks consists of people who dwell right here that come from overseas,” Lynch argued in response.
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??????Heated Conflict on BBC Newsnight: Mick Lynch vs Laila Cunningham
Final night time’s Newsnight delivered fireworks as ex-RMT boss Mick Lynch went head-to-head with Reform UK’s Laila Cunningham over immigration and welfare.
Cunningham pressed the easy query: ought to British… pic.twitter.com/L66rBidUd5
— J Stewart (@triffic_stuff_) June 9, 2026
“Effectively they are not British,” Cunningham returned, including: “If they don’t seem to be British nationals, they don’t seem to be British.” Asking Lynch if he believed that commerce union employees needs to be paying for individuals who have simply arrived within the UK to dwell in social housing, the previous RMT chief stated: “What we imagine in is that we pay for one another by a good tax system the place wealth is distributed correctly so that each one folks can advance.
“You imagine in isolating folks,” Lynch continued, “and profiting from poverty so that you could divide them and make your folks even richer.”
Shutting down Lynch’s feedback, Cunningham sighed loudly. “Basically, I do not even perceive what you stated,” she replied. “We basically imagine in a single precept that – maybe that is why you are dropping votes – is that when folks elect you, they’re there to serve the British folks and nobody else.”
Cunningham, who recurrently seems on Newsnight, isn’t any stranger to on-air disputes. Simply final week, the politician discovered herself in an explosive row with retired police superintendent Leroy Logan. The duo, who joined Matt Chorley to debate the Henry Nowak protests in Southampton, clashed over Reform chief Nigel Farage’s feedback about Nowak’s tragic homicide in December.
“We’re sitting right here discussing an anger that Nigel named, and in some way it’s illegitimate to call that, to call folks’s considerations and I am being instructed that that is what brought on incitement. Did you watch the video?” Cunningham stated.
“My situation is, you’re conflating two points,” Logan fired again. “No I am not,” Cunningham declared, prompting Chorley to intervene.


















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