Leading British legal professionals have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Conservative MP seen as a potential leadership candidate suggested that large numbers of legally settled families must be deported.
Divisive Remarks on Residency Rights
Katie Lam, a shadow Home Office minister and a Tory whip, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their right to stay revoked, to guarantee the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, later retreated from Lam’s statement last Thursday.
While Badenoch initially said the statement were “broadly in line” with official stance, she later reverted to existing policy that only revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. Nevertheless, the proposal has raised alarms for many as a signal of “dangerous times” and part of a larger political discourse.
Escalating Pattern of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In the past few months, politicians across political parties have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed proposals that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a political party leader complained about “numerous advertisements” seemingly including “ethnic minorities”, and in last autumn, the group’s head, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the primary pathway for immigration to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK risked becoming an “island of strangers” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the implications of that phrase were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a specific group,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of discrimination within the opposition party.
The barrister, whose parents migrated from the Caribbean, said the remarks were a barely concealed racial purity campaign”. The leading barrister said the present political debate was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had served the country, should still feel insecure.
“It’s a race to the bottom,” added the lawyer. “It’s desperate to see Labour feeling the only answer to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually talk about the positives of migration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Extremist Movements
Backing for the party has surged in the polls, and far-right marches have attracted large crowds to the capital, 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.
“These are perilous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has acted for hundreds of victims at the heart of the residency controversy, in which Britons from the former empire residing in the UK lawfully were classed wrongly as unauthorized immigrants.
McKenzie said her father, who moved to the UK from Jamaica in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Recently, her daughter has asked whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Currently we see young people in their 20s and 30s who have got two generations ahead of them, UK-born, feeling less than,” said McKenzie.
“These are extremely hazardous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a legitimate policy orientation for most political parties,” she continued. “The tenets of this, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about removing and expelling people who are legally in the country, and vast numbers of them as well. That’s something very different, isn’t it?”
Personal Impact
People with ILR status, or with partners who hold this status, have expressed that the recent policies suggested by political figures have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and described the wider political debate as discriminatory, frightening and unwelcoming.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a dual British-Jordanian citizen residing in Manchester with his family, said the recent surge of the party in the surveys had motivated him to get his British citizenship. For the last several years he has gone through the process of securing permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after relocating to the UK on a spousal visa. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he worries his family would be split up.
“It’s easy for someone to say now, well, that will never happen,” said Darwazeh, in his thirties. “It’s uncertain how this plays out in the coming years.”
While in daily life, he has “no problems”, he has been alarmed by the increase of national symbols in his neighbourhood, 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 think about it if the unfriendliness persists.
“It’s strange that in a nation where migrants are needed, nobody is promoting a positive story about immigration at all,” he remarked. “I just find the demonisation very odd and terrifying, long-term.”
