Nigel Farage: pay no attention to Vince Cable's 'rivers of blood' warning These comparisons bare no notice, we are certainly not talking, if we are to do comparisons, with the Jews or the Ugandan Asians, about people who are refugees at all - we are dealing here with economic migrants and also in the case of Romania and Bulgaria be dealing with social migrancy. That is not the same as the Jewish people from Russia and Germany fleeing in fear of their lives. I think Vince Cable is grossly exaggerating the comparison, but in the sense that he is highlighting an important issue I thank him for that if nothing else. Mr Cable said in an interview that the Prime Minister had made British voters "schizophrenic" on the issue and accused the Tories of "doing harm" with their "populist" immigration policies. His comments, just over a week before Britain opens its borders to migrants from Romania and Bulgaria, have inflamed tensions in the Coalition. Grant Shapps, the Conservative Party chairman described Mr Cable as a rude old Uncle at Christmas," but said that under the Coalition the Tories have little choice but to "live with it." He said: "Vince Cable's a bit like an old uncle at Christmas," Mr Shapps told the Evening Standard. On Sunday, Mr Cable told the Andrew Marr show on BBC One: "There's a bigger picture here. We periodically get these immigration panics, I remember going back to Enoch Powell and 'rivers of blood" and all that, and if you go back a century there were panics over Jewish immigrants. The responsibility of politicians in this situation, when people are getting anxious, is to try to reassure them and give them facts and not panic and resort to populist measures that do harm. Furious Tory MPs called on David Cameron to sack Mr Cable and expressed their frustration at the Prime Minister's failure to defend the party's policy on immigration. Mr Farage, meanwhile, thanked Mr Cable for "raising the very important issue" of migration. He said: "There wouldn't be any debate on this at all if it wasn't for the strength and popularity of Ukip, and the conservative party are terrified. They have rushed in these desperate reforms but with days to go, it is too little too late.