Prominent UK legal professionals have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Conservative MP seen as a potential leadership candidate proposed that large numbers of lawfully resident households must be removed from the country.
Controversial Statement on Legal Status
Katie Lam, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a party enforcer, remarked that individuals with lawful residence in the UK should have their permission to remain cancelled, to guarantee the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Tory leader, the party head, later retreated from these comments last Thursday.
While the leader initially said the statement were “broadly in line” with official stance, 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 “perilous periods” and part of a broader political conversation.
Growing Trend of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In the past few months, politicians across political parties have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed policies that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a political party leader expressed dissatisfaction about “numerous advertisements” seemingly featuring “ethnic minorities”, and in September, the party’s leader, 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 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 examined claims of racism within Labour.
The barrister, whose family emigrated from the West Indies, said the remarks were a “thinly disguised 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 contributed to the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” continued Forde. “It’s alarming to see the opposition feeling the only answer to Reform is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually discuss the benefits of migration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be accurate.”
Public Sentiment and Extremist Movements
Support for Reform has increased in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have attracted large crowds to London, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are similar to extremist rallies from decades past and fearful the UK is “regressing” as elected officials target migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has represented hundreds of victims at the heart of the residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the Commonwealth living in the UK lawfully were classed wrongly as illegal migrants.
The lawyer said her parent, who moved to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Recently, her daughter has asked whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Now we’re getting young people in their 20s and 30s who have got multiple generations ahead of them, UK-born, experiencing insecurity,” said the attorney.
“These are extremely hazardous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a acceptable political direction for many groups,” she continued. “The principles here, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about deporting and removing people who are lawfully resident, and vast numbers of them as well. That’s something very different, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
People with permanent residency, or with spouses who hold this status, have shared that the new proposals floated by political figures have left them feeling uncertain in the UK, and described the broader political anti-migrant discourse as discriminatory, frightening and hostile.
One individual, a person with dual nationality residing in the city with his family, said the recent surge of Reform in the surveys had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the past six years he has gone through the process of obtaining permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after moving to the UK on a spousal visa. Should the suggested changes be implemented, he worries his family would be split up.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” said the man, 37. “It’s uncertain how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While day to day, he has “no issues”, Darwazeh has been alarmed 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 family has no desire to leave, they may consider it if the hostility persists.
“It’s strange that in a country where migrants are required, nobody is promoting a positive story about immigration at all,” he added. “I consider the demonisation very peculiar and terrifying, for the future.”
