Leading UK legal professionals have raised alarms about a political “downward spiral”, after a Conservative MP considered a potential leadership candidate suggested that large numbers of legally settled families must be deported.
Divisive Remarks on Legal Status
Katie Lam, a shadow Home Office minister and a party enforcer, remarked that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to guarantee the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Tory leader, the party head, later distanced herself from these comments recently.
While the leader initially said the remarks were “broadly in line” with party policy, she later returned to current rules that only revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has broken the law. Nevertheless, the proposal has sparked concern 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, politicians across political parties have absorbed anti-immigration language and repeated policies that were once considered fringe. Most recently, a Reform UK leader expressed dissatisfaction about “every advert” seemingly featuring “ethnic minorities”, and in September, the group’s head, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate the primary pathway for migrants to gain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, the Labour leader said the UK risked becoming an “nation of foreigners” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the ramifications of that statement were not fully understood, and it was targeting a particular audience,” said a leading barrister, who has investigated claims of discrimination within Labour.
Forde, whose family emigrated from the Caribbean, said Lam’s comments were a “thinly disguised keep Britain white campaign”. The legal expert said the present political debate was an “utter condemnation” that someone like himself, from multiple generations of people who had served the country, should still experience anxiety.
“We’re in a downward spiral,” added Forde. “It’s desperate to see Labour feeling the only answer to the rival party is to try and out-Reform Reform, rather than actually talk about the positives of migration.
“The language has to change and has to be truthful.”
Public Sentiment and Extremist Movements
Backing for the party has surged in the surveys, and far-right marches have attracted large crowds to the capital, leaving many British people of colour feeling the situation are reminiscent of extremist rallies from decades past and fearful the UK is “regressing” 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 Britons from the Commonwealth residing in the UK lawfully were classed wrongly as unauthorized immigrants.
The lawyer said her parent, who emigrated to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the present debate. Lately, her child has questioned whether they should get Caribbean passports.
“Currently we see young people in their twenties and thirties who have got two generations ahead of them, UK-born, experiencing insecurity,” said the attorney.
“We are in really, really dangerous times where anti-migrant sentiment is being seen as a acceptable political direction for most political parties,” she added. “The principles here, the tentacles of it extend widely when you start talking about deporting and expelling people who are lawfully resident, and millions of them as well. That’s something very different, isn’t it?”
Personal Impact
People with ILR status, or with partners who hold this status, have expressed that the new proposals floated by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling insecure in the UK, and characterized the wider political debate as discriminatory, alarming and unwelcoming.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a person with dual nationality living 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 last several years he has gone through the procedure of obtaining permanent residency – at a huge financial cost – after moving to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the proposed policies be implemented, he fears his family would be split up.
“It’s easy for someone to say now, well, that will never happen,” said Darwazeh, in his thirties. “Who knows how this unfolds in the coming years.”
While in daily life, he has “no problems”, he has been alarmed by the proliferation of St George’s flags in his area, a trend 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.
“I find it really odd that in a nation where migrants are required, no one’s actually selling a beneficial narrative about migration at all,” he added. “I just find the vilification very peculiar and terrifying, long-term.”
