Leading British attorneys have raised alarms about a political “downward spiral”, after a Tory lawmaker seen as a potential leadership candidate suggested that large numbers of legally settled families must be removed from the country.
Controversial Statement on Legal Status
The MP, a shadow Home Office minister and a party enforcer, stated that individuals with lawful residence in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to ensure the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Conservative leader, the party head, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement recently.
While Badenoch initially said the remarks were “generally consistent” with party policy, she later reverted to existing policy that only withdraw permanent residency status if someone has committed a crime. However, the statement has raised alarms for many as a signal of “perilous periods” and belonging to a larger political discourse.
Escalating Pattern of Immigration Criticism
In recent months, leaders across various groups have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and repeated policies that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a political party leader complained about “every advert” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the group’s head, the figurehead, pledged to eliminate the main route for migrants to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK risked becoming an “island of strangers” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the ramifications of that phrase were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a particular audience,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of racism within Labour.
The barrister, whose parents migrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a barely concealed racial purity campaign”. The leading barrister said the present political debate was an “utter condemnation” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had contributed to the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added Forde. “It’s desperate to see the opposition 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 evolve and has to be accurate.”
Public Sentiment and Far-Right Activity
Support for Reform has increased in the surveys, and far-right marches have attracted large crowds to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are similar to extremist rallies from decades past and concerned the UK is “going backwards” as elected officials focus on migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has acted for hundreds of affected individuals at the centre of the residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the Commonwealth living in the UK legally were classed wrongly 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 present debate. Recently, her daughter has questioned whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Now we’re getting young people in their twenties and thirties who have got multiple generations ahead of them, born in Britain, experiencing insecurity,” said McKenzie.
“We are in really, really dangerous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a legitimate policy orientation for many groups,” she continued. “The principles here, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about deporting and expelling people who are lawfully resident, and vast numbers of them as well. This represents a major shift, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
Individuals with ILR status, or with partners who hold this status, have shared that the new proposals floated by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling uncertain in the UK, and characterized the broader political anti-migrant discourse as discriminatory, frightening and hostile.
One individual, a person with dual nationality living in Manchester with his wife and children, said the growing support of the party in the surveys 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 spousal visa. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he worries his family would be separated.
“It’s easy for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” said Darwazeh, in his thirties. “Who knows how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While day to day, he has “no issues”, Darwazeh has been alarmed by the proliferation of national symbols in his neighbourhood, a practice that has been widely adopted by the far-right and immigration opponents. Long-term, though the household has no wish to leave, they may consider it if the unfriendliness persists.
“I find it really odd that in a country where immigrants are needed, nobody is promoting a positive story about immigration at all,” he added. “I just find the demonisation very peculiar and terrifying, for the future.”
