Leading British attorneys have issued warnings about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Tory lawmaker seen as a future party leader suggested that large numbers of lawfully resident households must be deported.
Divisive Remarks on Legal Status
The MP, a shadow Home Office minister and a party enforcer, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their right to stay cancelled, to ensure the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Tory leader, the party head, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement last Thursday.
While the leader initially said the statement were “generally consistent” with party policy, she later reverted to existing policy that only revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. Nevertheless, the statement has raised alarms for many as a indication of “perilous periods” and part of a broader political conversation.
Escalating Pattern of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In the past few months, politicians across various groups have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and repeated proposals that were once seen as extreme. Most recently, a political party leader complained about “numerous advertisements” seemingly including “black and Asian people”, and in last autumn, the party’s leader, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the primary pathway for immigration to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK risked becoming an “island of strangers” without tougher immigration policies.
“I don’t accept that the implications of that statement were not comprehended, and it was targeting a specific group,” said Martin Forde KC, who has investigated claims of discrimination within Labour.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the West Indies, said Lam’s comments were a barely concealed keep Britain white campaign”. The legal expert said the present political debate was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from multiple generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“It’s a race to the bottom,” continued Forde. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the sole solution to Reform is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually discuss the positives of migration.
“The rhetoric has to evolve and has to be truthful.”
Public Sentiment and Far-Right Activity
Backing for the party has surged in the polls, and extremist demonstrations have attracted large crowds to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are similar to extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “going backwards” as elected officials focus on migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has acted for hundreds of victims at the centre of the Windrush scandal, in which Britons from the Commonwealth living in the UK legally were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
McKenzie said her father, who moved to the UK from Jamaica in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the present debate. Lately, her daughter has questioned 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 the attorney.
“These are extremely hazardous 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 removing and expelling people who are lawfully resident, and vast numbers of them as well. That’s something very different, isn’t it?”
Personal Impact
Individuals with ILR status, or with partners who hold this status, have shared that the recent policies suggested by political figures have left them feeling uncertain in the UK, and described the broader political anti-migrant discourse as racist, frightening and unwelcoming.
One individual, a person with dual nationality living in Manchester with his wife and children, said the growing support of Reform in the surveys had motivated him to get his UK passport. For the last several years he has gone through the procedure of obtaining ILR – at a huge financial cost – after relocating to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the proposed policies be implemented, 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 unfolds in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no problems”, he has been concerned by the proliferation of St George’s flags in his area, a practice that has been widely co-opted by the far-right and immigration opponents. Long-term, though the family has no desire to leave, they may consider it if the unfriendliness continues.
“It’s strange that in a nation where immigrants are required, nobody is promoting a beneficial narrative about immigration at all,” he remarked. “I just find the demonisation very odd and frightening, long-term.”
