Leading British legal professionals have raised alarms about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Tory lawmaker considered a potential leadership candidate proposed that significant quantities of legally settled families must be removed from the country.
Controversial Statement on Residency Rights
The MP, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a party enforcer, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to ensure the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Tory leader, the party head, later retreated from Lam’s statement recently.
While Badenoch initially said the statement were “broadly in line” with party policy, she later returned to existing policy that only revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. However, the statement has raised alarms for many as a signal of “dangerous times” and belonging to a broader political conversation.
Growing Trend of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In the past few months, leaders across political parties have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed proposals that were once considered fringe. Lately, a Reform UK leader expressed dissatisfaction about “numerous advertisements” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the party’s leader, the figurehead, pledged to eliminate the main route for immigration 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 phrase were not fully understood, and it was targeting a specific group,” said Martin Forde KC, who has investigated claims of discrimination within the opposition party.
Forde, whose family migrated from the Caribbean, said the remarks were a “thinly disguised keep Britain white campaign”. The leading barrister said the present political debate was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had contributed to the country, should still feel insecure.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added Forde. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the only answer to Reform is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually talk about the positives of immigration.
“The language has to evolve and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Extremist Movements
Support for Reform has surged in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have drawn thousands to the capital, leaving many minority ethnic Britons feeling the situation are similar to extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “going backwards” as politicians target migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has acted for hundreds of affected individuals at the heart of the Windrush scandal, in which Britons from the former empire living in the UK lawfully were classed wrongly as unauthorized immigrants.
McKenzie said her father, who moved to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Recently, her child has asked whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Currently we see kids in their 20s and 30s who have got multiple generations ahead of them, born in Britain, experiencing insecurity,” said the attorney.
“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 tenets of this, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about removing and expelling people who are lawfully resident, and millions of them as well. This represents a major shift, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
Individuals with ILR status, or with partners 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 broader political anti-migrant discourse as racist, frightening and hostile.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a dual British-Jordanian citizen living in the city with his family, said the recent surge of the party in the surveys had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the last several years he has gone through the procedure of securing ILR – at a significant expense – after relocating 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, in his thirties. “Who knows how this unfolds in the coming years.”
While day to day, he has “no problems”, Darwazeh has been alarmed by the proliferation of St George’s flags in his neighbourhood, a trend that has been widely co-opted by the extremist groups and anti-immigration protesters. In the future, though the household has no wish to leave, they may consider it if the hostility continues.
“I find it really odd that in a nation where migrants are needed, no one’s actually selling a positive story about migration at all,” he remarked. “I consider the demonisation very peculiar and frightening, for the future.”
