Prominent British legal professionals have issued warnings about a political “downward spiral”, after a Tory lawmaker seen as a future party leader suggested 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 party enforcer, remarked that individuals with lawful residence in the UK should have their permission to remain revoked, to ensure the UK remains predominantly “culturally uniform”. The Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, later distanced herself from Lam’s statement last Thursday.
While Badenoch initially said the remarks were “generally consistent” 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 raised alarms for many as a signal of “dangerous times” and belonging to a broader political conversation.
Escalating Pattern of Immigration Criticism
In the past few months, leaders across political parties have absorbed anti-immigration language and echoed proposals that were once considered fringe. Lately, a Reform UK leader expressed dissatisfaction about “every advert” seemingly featuring “ethnic minorities”, and in last autumn, the party’s leader, Nigel Farage, pledged to eliminate 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 ramifications of that phrase were not fully understood, and it was appealing to a specific group,” said Martin Forde KC, who has investigated claims of racism within the opposition party.
Forde, whose parents emigrated from the Caribbean, said the remarks were a barely concealed keep Britain white campaign”. The legal expert said the current political discourse 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,” continued Forde. “It’s alarming to see Labour feeling the only answer to the rival party is to try and outdo their policies, rather than actually discuss the positives of migration.
“The rhetoric has to change and has to be accurate.”
National Mood and Extremist Movements
Support for Reform has surged in the surveys, and extremist demonstrations have drawn thousands to London, leaving many minority ethnic Britons feeling the situation are similar to far-right marches from previous eras and fearful the UK is “regressing” as politicians focus on migrants.
“These are perilous times,” said Jacqueline McKenzie, who has acted for hundreds of victims at the centre of the residency controversy, in which UK citizens from the Commonwealth living in the UK lawfully were mistakenly categorized as unauthorized immigrants.
The lawyer said her father, who moved to the UK from the Caribbean in 1951, would be deeply disturbed over the current discourse. Lately, her child has asked whether they should get overseas citizenship.
“Currently we see kids in their twenties and thirties who have got two generations ahead of them, UK-born, feeling less than,” said McKenzie.
“We are in really, really dangerous times where anti-immigrant fervour is being seen as a legitimate policy orientation for most political parties,” she continued. “The principles here, the tentacles of it extend widely when you start talking about removing and expelling people who are legally in the country, 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 shared 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, frightening and unwelcoming.
One individual, a dual British-Jordanian citizen residing in the city with his family, said the recent surge of Reform in the polls had pushed him to get his British citizenship. For the past six years he has gone through the procedure of securing ILR – 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 not occur,” said Darwazeh, 37. “It’s uncertain how this plays out in the coming years.”
While day to day, he has “no problems”, Darwazeh has been concerned by the increase of national symbols in his neighbourhood, a practice that has been widely co-opted by the far-right and immigration opponents. In the future, though the household has no wish to leave, they may think about it if the hostility continues.
“It’s strange that in a country where immigrants are required, nobody is promoting a positive story about migration at all,” he added. “I just find the demonisation very odd and frightening, long-term.”
