Leading British legal professionals have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Tory lawmaker considered a future party leader proposed that large numbers of legally settled families must be removed from the country.
Controversial Statement on Legal Status
Katie Lam, a opposition home affairs spokesperson and a party enforcer, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their right to stay revoked, to ensure the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Conservative leader, the party head, later distanced herself from these comments recently.
While Badenoch initially said the remarks were “broadly in line” with party policy, she later returned to existing policy that only withdraw indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. Nevertheless, the statement has sparked concern for many as a indication of “dangerous times” and part of a broader political conversation.
Escalating Pattern of Anti-Migrant Rhetoric
In recent months, leaders across various groups have absorbed anti-migrant rhetoric and repeated proposals that were once seen as extreme. Most recently, a political party leader expressed dissatisfaction about “numerous advertisements” seemingly including “black and Asian people”, and in last autumn, the party’s leader, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the main route for immigration to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer 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 appealing to a particular audience,” said Martin Forde KC, who has examined claims of racism within Labour.
The barrister, whose family emigrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a “thinly disguised keep Britain white campaign”. The leading barrister said the current political discourse was an “absolute indictment” that someone like himself, from multiple generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” continued Forde. “It’s alarming to see the opposition feeling the sole solution to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually discuss the positives of migration.
“The language has to change and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Extremist Movements
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 situation are similar to extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “regressing” as elected officials focus on migrants.
“We’re in very dangerous 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 lawfully were classed wrongly as unauthorized immigrants.
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, born in Britain, 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 continued. “The principles here, the reach of it extend widely when you start talking about removing 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 partners who hold this status, have shared that the recent policies floated by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and described the broader political anti-migrant discourse as racist, alarming and unwelcoming.
One individual, a dual British-Jordanian citizen living in Manchester with his family, 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 securing permanent residency – at a significant expense – after moving to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the suggested changes be enacted, he fears his family would be separated.
“It’s simple for someone to say now, well, that will not occur,” said the man, in his thirties. “Who knows how this plays out in two, three years.”
While day to day, he has “no issues”, he has been alarmed by the increase of St George’s flags in his area, a practice that has been widely co-opted by the far-right and anti-immigration protesters. Long-term, though the household has no desire to leave, they may think about it if the unfriendliness persists.
“I find it really odd that in a nation where immigrants are required, no one’s actually selling a beneficial narrative about immigration at all,” he added. “I just find the demonisation very odd and frightening, for the future.”
