Leading UK attorneys have raised alarms about a political “race to the bottom”, after a Tory lawmaker considered a future party leader proposed that large numbers of legally settled families must be deported.
Controversial Statement on Legal Status
Katie Lam, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a party enforcer, remarked 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 retreated from Lam’s statement recently.
While the leader initially said the remarks were “broadly in line” with official stance, she later reverted to current rules 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 signal of “dangerous times” and part of a broader political conversation.
Escalating Pattern of Immigration Criticism
In the past few months, leaders across various groups have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed policies that were once seen as extreme. Most recently, a political party leader expressed dissatisfaction about “every advert” seemingly featuring “black and Asian people”, and in September, the party’s leader, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate the main route for migrants to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK risked becoming an “nation of foreigners” without stricter border controls.
“It’s hard to believe that the implications of that phrase were not comprehended, and it was targeting a specific group,” said Martin Forde KC, who has examined claims of racism within the opposition party.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a “thinly disguised racial purity campaign”. The legal expert said the current political discourse was an “utter condemnation” that someone like himself, from generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added the lawyer. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the sole solution to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually discuss the benefits of immigration.
“The language has to change and has to be accurate.”
Public Sentiment and Extremist Movements
Backing for the party has increased in the surveys, and far-right marches have drawn thousands to London, leaving many British people of colour feeling the circumstances are reminiscent of far-right marches from previous eras and fearful the UK is “going backwards” as politicians target migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous times,” said an immigration lawyer, who has acted for hundreds of affected individuals at the centre of the Windrush scandal, in which UK citizens from the Commonwealth residing in the UK legally were classed wrongly as illegal migrants.
McKenzie said her parent, who moved to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the present debate. Lately, her daughter has questioned whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Now we’re getting kids in their twenties and thirties who have got multiple 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 legitimate policy orientation for many groups,” she continued. “The tenets of this, the reach of it spread so far when you start talking about deporting and removing people who are lawfully resident, and vast numbers of them as well. This represents a major shift, isn’t it?”
Individual Consequences
People with ILR status, or with spouses who hold this status, have expressed that the new proposals floated by political figures have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and characterized the broader political anti-migrant discourse as racist, frightening and hostile.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a person with dual nationality living in the city with his wife and children, said the recent surge of Reform in the surveys had motivated him to get his UK passport. 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 implemented, he worries his family would be split up.
“It’s easy for someone to say now, well, that will never happen,” said the man, 37. “It’s uncertain how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no problems”, he has been alarmed by the increase of national symbols in his neighbourhood, a trend that has been widely adopted by the extremist groups and immigration opponents. Long-term, though the family has no desire to leave, they may think about it if the unfriendliness persists.
“It’s strange that in a nation where migrants are needed, nobody is promoting a positive story about immigration at all,” he remarked. “I consider the demonisation very odd and frightening, long-term.”
