Leading UK attorneys have issued warnings about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Tory lawmaker seen as a potential leadership candidate proposed that significant quantities of legally settled families must be deported.
Controversial Statement on Legal Status
The MP, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a Tory whip, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their permission to remain cancelled, to ensure the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Conservative leader, the party head, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement recently.
While Badenoch initially said the statement were “generally consistent” with party policy, she later returned to current rules that only revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has committed a crime. However, the proposal has raised alarms for many as a indication of “dangerous times” and part of a larger political discourse.
Growing Trend of Immigration Criticism
In the past few months, politicians across political parties have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed policies that were once considered fringe. Lately, a political party leader complained about “numerous advertisements” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the party’s leader, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate the main route for migrants to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK faced the danger of becoming an “nation of foreigners” without stricter border controls.
“I don’t accept that the implications of that statement were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a particular audience,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of discrimination within the opposition party.
The barrister, whose parents emigrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a barely concealed keep Britain white campaign”. The leading barrister said the current political discourse was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from multiple generations of people who had contributed to the country, should still experience anxiety.
“It’s a race to the bottom,” added the lawyer. “It’s desperate to see the opposition feeling the only answer to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually talk about the benefits of migration.
“The language has to change and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Far-Right Activity
Backing for the party has surged in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have attracted large crowds to London, leaving many British people of colour feeling the situation are similar to extremist rallies from previous eras and concerned the UK is “going backwards” as elected officials focus on migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has acted for hundreds of victims at the heart of the residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the former empire residing in the UK legally were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
McKenzie said her parent, who moved to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the present debate. Recently, her child has questioned whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Now we’re getting kids in their 20s and 30s who have got two generations ahead of them, born in Britain, feeling less than,” said McKenzie.
“We are in really, really dangerous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a acceptable political direction for many groups,” she added. “The principles here, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about deporting and expelling people who are legally in the country, and vast numbers of them as well. This represents a major shift, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
Individuals with ILR status, or with spouses who hold this status, have shared that the new proposals suggested by political figures have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and characterized the wider political debate as racist, alarming and unwelcoming.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a dual British-Jordanian citizen living in the city with his wife and children, said the growing support of the party in the surveys had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the past six years he has gone through the process of securing ILR – at a significant expense – after moving to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he worries his family would be separated.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will never happen,” said Darwazeh, 37. “Who knows how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no problems”, Darwazeh has been concerned by the proliferation of national symbols in his area, a trend that has been widely co-opted by the far-right and anti-immigration protesters. Long-term, though the family has no desire to leave, they may consider it if the unfriendliness continues.
“I find it really odd that in a nation where migrants are required, no one’s actually selling a positive story about migration at all,” he added. “I just find the vilification very peculiar and terrifying, for the future.”
