Prominent UK attorneys have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Conservative MP seen as a potential leadership candidate proposed that large numbers of legally settled families must be removed from the country.
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 mostly “culturally coherent”. The Tory leader, the party head, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement recently.
While the leader initially said the remarks were “broadly in line” with party policy, she later reverted to current rules that only revoke permanent residency status if someone has committed a crime. Nevertheless, the statement has raised alarms for many as a indication of “perilous periods” and belonging to a broader political conversation.
Escalating Pattern of Immigration Criticism
In recent months, politicians across various groups have adopted anti-immigration language and echoed proposals that were once considered fringe. Lately, a Reform UK leader complained about “numerous advertisements” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the group’s head, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the primary pathway for migrants to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK risked becoming an “island of strangers” without stricter border controls.
“I don’t accept that the implications of that phrase were not comprehended, and it was appealing to a specific group,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of racism within the opposition party.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the West Indies, said Lam’s comments were a “thinly disguised racial purity campaign”. The legal expert said the present political debate was an “utter condemnation” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“It’s a race to the bottom,” continued the lawyer. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the only answer to the rival party is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually discuss the benefits of migration.
“The language has to change and has to be truthful.”
Public Sentiment and Far-Right Activity
Support for Reform has surged in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have drawn thousands to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the situation are reminiscent of far-right marches from decades past and fearful the UK is “regressing” as politicians target migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has acted for hundreds of affected individuals at the heart of the residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the former empire residing in the UK legally were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
The lawyer said her father, who moved to the UK from Jamaica in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the current discourse. Recently, her child has asked whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Now we’re getting kids in their 20s and 30s 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 legitimate policy orientation for most political parties,” she added. “The tenets of this, the tentacles of it spread so far when you start talking about removing and expelling people who are lawfully resident, and millions of them as well. That’s something very different, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
Individuals with ILR status, or with partners who hold this status, have expressed that the new proposals suggested by political figures have left them feeling uncertain in the UK, and described the broader political anti-migrant discourse as racist, alarming and unwelcoming.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a person with dual nationality living in Manchester with his family, said the growing support of the party in the polls had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the past six years he has gone through the process of securing permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after relocating to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the proposed policies be enacted, he worries his family would be split up.
“It’s easy for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” 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 concerned by the increase of national symbols in his area, a practice that has been widely adopted by the far-right and anti-immigration protesters. In the future, though the household has no desire to leave, they may think about it if the hostility persists.
“I find it really odd that in a country where migrants are needed, no one’s actually selling a positive story about migration at all,” he remarked. “I consider the demonisation very odd and frightening, long-term.”
