Prominent British attorneys have raised alarms about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Tory lawmaker considered a potential leadership candidate suggested that significant quantities of legally settled families must be deported.
Divisive Remarks on Legal Status
Katie Lam, a shadow Home Office minister and a Tory whip, remarked that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to ensure the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, later retreated from Lam’s statement last Thursday.
While the leader initially said the statement were “broadly in line” with party policy, she later returned to current rules that only withdraw permanent residency 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 broader political conversation.
Growing Trend of Immigration Criticism
In the past few months, leaders across political parties have absorbed anti-immigration language and echoed proposals that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a Reform UK leader complained about “every advert” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the group’s head, Nigel Farage, pledged to abolish the main route for immigration to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK risked becoming an “nation of foreigners” without stricter border controls.
“I don’t accept that the ramifications of that statement were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a particular audience,” said a leading barrister, who has examined claims of racism within the opposition party.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a “thinly disguised racial purity campaign”. The legal expert said the present political debate 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 Forde. “It’s alarming to see the opposition feeling the sole solution to the rival party is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually discuss the benefits 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 attracted large crowds to London, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are reminiscent of extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “regressing” as politicians target migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, 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.
McKenzie said her father, who emigrated to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the present debate. Lately, her daughter has asked whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Currently we see kids in their twenties and thirties who have got multiple generations ahead of them, UK-born, feeling less than,” said McKenzie.
“These are extremely hazardous times where anti-migrant sentiment is being seen as a acceptable political direction for many groups,” she added. “The principles here, the reach of it spread so far 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?”
Individual Consequences
People with ILR status, or with spouses who hold this status, have expressed 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.
One individual, a person with dual nationality 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 permanent residency – at a significant expense – after relocating to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he fears his family would be separated.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will never happen,” said the man, in his thirties. “Who knows how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no issues”, he has been alarmed by the proliferation of St George’s flags in his area, a practice that has been widely adopted by the far-right and immigration opponents. In the future, though the family has no wish to leave, they may think about it if the unfriendliness continues.
“It’s strange that in a country where immigrants are required, no one’s actually selling a positive story about immigration at all,” he remarked. “I consider the vilification very peculiar and terrifying, long-term.”
