Leading British legal professionals have raised alarms about a political “downward spiral”, after a Tory lawmaker seen as a future party leader proposed that significant quantities of lawfully resident households must be deported.
Divisive Remarks on Legal Status
The MP, a shadow Home Office minister and a party enforcer, remarked that individuals with lawful residence in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to guarantee the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement recently.
While Badenoch initially said the remarks were “broadly in line” with official stance, she later reverted to existing policy that only withdraw indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. However, the statement has raised alarms for many as a indication of “perilous periods” and belonging to a larger political discourse.
Growing Trend of Immigration Criticism
In recent months, leaders across political parties have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and repeated proposals that were once seen as extreme. Most recently, a Reform UK leader expressed dissatisfaction about “every advert” seemingly including “black and Asian people”, and in September, the group’s head, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate the primary pathway for migrants to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK faced the danger of becoming an “island of strangers” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the ramifications of that statement were not fully understood, and it was targeting a specific group,” said a leading barrister, who has examined claims of racism within the opposition party.
The barrister, whose family emigrated from the West Indies, said the remarks were a barely concealed racial purity campaign”. The leading barrister said the current political discourse was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had contributed to the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” continued Forde. “It’s alarming to see the opposition feeling the sole solution to Reform is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually discuss the benefits of migration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be truthful.”
National Mood and Far-Right Activity
Support for Reform has surged in the polls, and extremist demonstrations have drawn thousands to London, leaving many British people of colour feeling the situation are reminiscent of far-right marches from previous eras and fearful the UK is “regressing” as politicians focus on migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has represented hundreds of victims at the centre of the Windrush scandal, in which Britons from the former empire residing in the UK lawfully were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
The lawyer said her father, who moved to the UK from Jamaica in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Lately, her daughter has asked whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Now we’re getting young people in their twenties and thirties who have got multiple generations ahead of them, born in Britain, feeling less than,” said the attorney.
“We are in really, really dangerous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a legitimate policy orientation for most political parties,” she added. “The principles here, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about deporting and removing people who are lawfully resident, and millions of them as well. This represents a major shift, isn’t it?”
Personal Impact
Individuals with ILR status, or with spouses who hold this status, have shared that the new proposals suggested by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and described the wider political debate as discriminatory, frightening and unwelcoming.
One individual, a dual British-Jordanian citizen living in Manchester with his wife and children, said the growing support of the party in the polls had pushed him to get his British citizenship. For the last several years he has gone through the process of obtaining ILR – at a huge financial cost – after moving to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the proposed policies be enacted, he fears his family would be split up.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” said Darwazeh, in his thirties. “It’s uncertain how this plays out in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no issues”, he has been concerned by the proliferation of national symbols in his neighbourhood, a trend that has been widely co-opted by the extremist groups and anti-immigration protesters. In the future, though the family has no desire to leave, they may consider it if the unfriendliness continues.
“It’s strange that in a country where immigrants are needed, no one’s actually selling a positive story about immigration at all,” he remarked. “I just find the vilification very odd and terrifying, for the future.”
