[pmyteh]

Yes, they pursued migration because they considered it to be economically beneficial. But their electoral coalition also included groups which disliked it - retirees in particular, and some parts of the older white working class vote too as you note. So the action to increase 'good' migration was never really openly argued for as a public good (your quote is from an advisor, and would never have been released at the time) while being matched with Mail-placating rhetoric on asylum designed to separate the idea of deserving and undeserving migrants and demonstrate 'getting tough' on those who were sufficiently unpopular. There was a huge increase in the use of immigration detention, for example, and the deliberate destitution of many asylum seekers as a means of appearing tough. As with many New Labour policy areas, the aim was not to get the policy 'right' and leave it, but to keep the issue live to generate a steady series of headlines indicating that something was being done. Criminal justice policy was similar, with more than one reform bill a year for most of the period of the government.

So overall, I don't see deliberately increasing migration and deliberately using dehumanising rhetoric and policy changes against (some) immigrants to shore up electoral support as being at odds. The current government is strong on anti-tax rhetoric whilst presiding over heavy tax rises. Labour wanted immigration to keep wages low and increase growth. It also wanted the votes of people who wouldn't want that. So it did the former fairly quietly, while performatively stoking up the Home Office's capacity for villainy. So is modern politics.

(FWIW 'Floodgates' is itself somewhat dehumanising, I think: people aren't an undifferentiated mass threatening to overwhelm the boat, they're just people. 'Gates' would have done just fine.)