SIR KEIR STARMER has stood by his use of Enoch Powell’s language to describe the consequences of immigration as a political storm broke over his “shameful scapegoating.”

MPs queued up to denounce his invocation of Powell’s notorious 1968 “rivers of blood” speech on Monday, and in particular his reference to Britain becoming “an island of strangers.”

Britain’s longest-serving woman MP Labour’s Diane Abbott said Sir Keir’s speech marked “a shameful day in British politics and a shameful day for the Labour Party. It will not end well for either.”

Suspended Labour MP John McDonnell warned that “talk of an ‘island of strangers’ shockingly echoes the divisive language of Enoch Powell,” while Zarah Sultana, also suspended, called the speech “sickening” and a “disgrace.”

“Shame on you, Keir Starmer,” she added.

Labour MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy said that migrants “are not ‘strangers’, they are our friends, neighbours and family members. It is shameful that they are being scapegoated in this way.”

Many MPs also connected the scapegoating of migrants with the government’s shortcomings in fixing social problems. 

Independent MP Jeremy Corbyn said: “The problems in our society are not caused by migrants or refugees. 

“They are caused by an economic system rigged in favour of corporations and billionaires. If the government wanted to improve people’s lives, it would tax the rich and build an economy that works for us all.”

Labour’s Andy McDonald called on ministers to “prioritise public services, employment rights and people’s incomes. Migrants are not responsible for their decline — Conservative cuts and poor employers are.”

And Richard Burgon MP pointed out that “migrants didn’t cause the housing crisis. Migrants didn’t cause the NHS crisis. Migrants didn’t drive up poverty levels.

“Years of austerity did all that. If you want to improve people’s lives, then stop the cuts, introduce a wealth tax and properly invest in our communities.”

And London Mayor Sadiq Khan, normally a loyalist, piled in, saying that "those aren’t words that I’d use."

Downing Street claimed that any resemblance between the Prime Minister and Enoch Powell was entirely coincidental. 

The similarity in wording “was an accident, and not designed to cause a row,” according to a source cited by the Guardian.

However, there was no backing down. A Downing Street spokesperson said the Prime Minister was unconcerned about his language and “absolutely stands behind the argument he was making that migrants make a massive contribution to our country, but migration needs to be controlled.

“This government is not going to shy away from this issue. The public are rightly concerned about the impact that uncontrolled migration has had on the UK.”

The premier was backed by Tory hard-rightist, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick, who said Sir Keir’s remarks were “true.”