Leading UK legal professionals have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Tory lawmaker considered 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 shadow Home Office minister and a Tory whip, stated that individuals with legal status in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to guarantee the UK remains mostly “culturally coherent”. The Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, 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 revoke indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status if someone has committed a crime. Nevertheless, the proposal has sparked concern for many as a signal of “perilous periods” and part of a larger political discourse.
Escalating Pattern of Immigration Criticism
In recent months, politicians across political parties have adopted anti-migrant rhetoric and echoed policies that were once considered fringe. Lately, a political party leader complained about “every advert” seemingly including “ethnic minorities”, and in last autumn, the party’s leader, the figurehead, pledged to abolish the main route for immigration to obtain British citizenship.
Earlier this year, Keir Starmer said the UK faced the danger of becoming an “nation of foreigners” without tougher immigration policies.
“It’s hard to believe that the ramifications of that phrase were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a particular audience,” said Martin Forde KC, who has investigated claims of racism within the opposition party.
The barrister, whose parents migrated from the West Indies, 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 contributed to the country, should still experience anxiety.
“It’s a race to the bottom,” added the lawyer. “It’s desperate to see the opposition feeling the sole solution to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually talk about the positives of immigration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be truthful.”
Public Sentiment and Extremist Movements
Backing for the party has surged in the polls, and far-right marches have drawn thousands to London, leaving many minority ethnic Britons feeling the situation are similar to extremist rallies from previous eras and fearful the UK is “regressing” as politicians target migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has acted for hundreds of affected individuals at the heart of the Windrush scandal, in which Britons from the former empire living in the UK lawfully were mistakenly categorized as illegal migrants.
McKenzie said her father, who emigrated to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be rolling in his grave over the current discourse. Recently, her child has asked whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Now we’re getting young people in their 20s and 30s 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-migrant sentiment is being seen as a legitimate policy orientation for most political parties,” she added. “The principles here, the reach of it spread so far when you start talking about deporting and expelling 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 expressed that the new proposals suggested by Conservative and Reform leaders have left them feeling uncertain in the UK, and described the broader political anti-migrant discourse as discriminatory, frightening and unwelcoming.
Ramzi Darwazeh, a person with dual nationality residing in the city with his wife and children, said the recent surge of the party in the surveys had pushed him to get his UK passport. For the last several years he has gone through the procedure of securing ILR – at a significant expense – after moving to the UK on a marriage permit. Should the suggested changes 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, 37. “It’s uncertain how this unfolds in two, three years.”
While in daily life, he has “no issues”, Darwazeh has been alarmed by the increase of St George’s flags in his area, a practice that has been widely co-opted by the extremist groups and immigration opponents. In the future, though the family has no wish to leave, they may consider it if the hostility continues.
“It’s strange that in a country where immigrants are required, no one’s actually selling a beneficial narrative about migration at all,” he remarked. “I just find the demonisation very peculiar and frightening, for the future.”
