Prominent UK attorneys have issued warnings about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Conservative MP considered a potential leadership candidate suggested that large numbers of lawfully resident households must be removed from the country.
Controversial Statement on Residency Rights
Katie Lam, a opposition home affairs spokesperson 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 Tory leader, the party head, later retreated from these comments last Thursday.
While the leader initially said the statement were “generally consistent” with official stance, she later returned to existing policy that only withdraw permanent residency status if someone has committed a crime. Nevertheless, the proposal has sparked concern for many as a indication of “perilous periods” and part of a broader political conversation.
Growing Trend of Immigration Criticism
In the past few months, leaders across political parties have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and repeated proposals that were once seen as extreme. Most recently, a political party leader expressed dissatisfaction about “numerous advertisements” seemingly including “black and Asian people”, and in September, the group’s head, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the primary pathway for migrants to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK risked becoming an “nation of foreigners” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the ramifications of that phrase were not fully understood, and it was targeting a particular audience,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of discrimination within Labour.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the West Indies, said the remarks were a “thinly disguised keep Britain white campaign”. The legal expert said the current political discourse was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added the lawyer. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the sole solution to Reform is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually discuss the positives of migration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Far-Right Activity
Support for Reform has surged in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have attracted large crowds to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are reminiscent of extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “going backwards” as politicians focus on migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has represented hundreds of victims at the heart of the Windrush scandal, in which Britons from the former empire living in the UK legally were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
The lawyer said her parent, who emigrated to the UK from Jamaica in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Recently, her child has questioned whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Currently we see young people in their 20s and 30s who have got two 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 principles here, the tentacles of it spread so far when you start talking about deporting and removing 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 uncertain in the UK, and described the wider political debate as discriminatory, alarming and hostile.
One individual, a dual British-Jordanian citizen residing in Manchester with his wife and children, said the recent surge of Reform in the surveys had motivated him to get his UK passport. For the last several years he has gone through the process of obtaining permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after moving to the UK on a spousal visa. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he worries his family would be split up.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” said the man, 37. “Who knows how this plays out in the coming years.”
While day to day, he has “no issues”, he has been alarmed by the increase of national symbols in his neighbourhood, a trend that has been widely co-opted by the extremist groups and immigration opponents. Long-term, though the family has no wish to leave, they may consider it if the hostility persists.
“I find it really odd that in a country where migrants are needed, no one’s actually selling a beneficial narrative about migration at all,” he remarked. “I consider the demonisation very odd and frightening, long-term.”
