Leading British attorneys have raised alarms about a political “downward spiral”, after a Conservative MP seen as a potential leadership candidate proposed that significant quantities of lawfully resident households must be removed from the country.
Divisive Remarks on Legal Status
The MP, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a Tory whip, stated that individuals with lawful residence in the UK should have their right to stay cancelled, to guarantee the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Tory leader, the party head, later retreated from Lam’s statement last Thursday.
While Badenoch initially said the statement were “generally consistent” with party policy, she later returned to current rules that only withdraw permanent residency status if someone has broken the law. However, the statement has sparked concern for many as a signal of “dangerous times” and belonging to a larger political discourse.
Growing Trend of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In the past few months, leaders across various groups have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed policies that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a Reform UK leader expressed dissatisfaction about “numerous advertisements” seemingly including “black and Asian people”, and in last autumn, the party’s leader, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate the main route for migrants to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK faced the danger of 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 targeting a specific group,” said a leading barrister, who has examined claims of racism within the opposition party.
Forde, whose family migrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a barely concealed keep Britain white campaign”. The legal expert said the current political discourse was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from multiple generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added the lawyer. “It’s desperate to see Labour feeling the sole solution to Reform is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually talk about the positives of immigration.
“The language has to change and has to be truthful.”
Public Sentiment and Extremist Movements
Backing for the party has increased in the polls, and extremist demonstrations have drawn thousands to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the situation are similar to extremist rallies from decades past and concerned 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 residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the Commonwealth residing in the UK lawfully were mistakenly categorized as unauthorized immigrants.
The lawyer said her father, who emigrated to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the current discourse. Recently, her daughter has questioned whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Currently we see young people in their twenties and thirties 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 tenets of this, the reach of it spread so far when you start talking about deporting and removing people who are legally in the country, 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 expressed that the new proposals floated by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and characterized the wider political debate as discriminatory, alarming and hostile.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a dual British-Jordanian citizen residing in Manchester with his wife and children, said the growing support of Reform in the polls had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the last several years he has gone through the procedure of obtaining permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after moving to the UK on a spousal visa. Should the proposed policies 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 plays out in two, three years.”
While day to day, he has “no issues”, he has been alarmed by the proliferation of national symbols in his area, a practice that has been widely co-opted by the far-right 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 immigrants are needed, nobody is promoting a beneficial narrative about migration at all,” he remarked. “I just find the demonisation very peculiar and frightening, for the future.”
