Latest / The Fourcast / Does the UK really want Nigel Farage’s mass deportation plan?

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Does the UK really want Nigel Farage’s mass deportation plan? · The Fourcast

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  25 years ago, in the year 2000, the white British population was
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  about 90% of the British population.
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  It is now closer to 70%. We've seen a huge demographic
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  change. But do you do you mind about
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  that? I mean, what's the problem?
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  I think that's an enormous problem to to a lot of people, I
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  think. We're heading back into really
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  worrying times and also that this is being caused a lot by
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  politicians and by sections of the media.
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  Nigel Farage is talking about paying autocratic regimes.
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  He's talking about dismantling Britain's post war treaties and
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  fundamental rights, locking up women and children.
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  I mean, is this who we are as a country?
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  Hello and welcome to the forecast.
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  Nigel Farage has put mass deportations at the centre of
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  his new immigration plan, promising to detain and remove
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  hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers from the UK.
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  While Reform currently only have 4 MPs, polling suggests they
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  could win the next election and be in a position to implement
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  this. It is a striking escalation in
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  the rhetoric around immigration, raising the question of whether
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  this marks a real turning point in British politics.
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  Has anything like this been attempted or is it even
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  possible? And how does it fit into the
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  long, often heated history of immigration policy in the UK?
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  Joining me, Jacqueline Mackenzie, a partner at the
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  human rights law firm Lee Day, who specialises in immigration
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  and asylum cases, and journalist and author David Goodhart, who's
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  written extensively about immigration.
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  Welcome to you both. David Goodhart, let me start
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  with you. Do you think the public will see
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  Nigel Farage's plan as sort of solving a problem more?
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  Will they view it as sounding a bit bigoted?
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  Well, the public will be divided on it, but I think, you know,
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  given what we've seen recently in opinion polling, how
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  immigrant, I mean, despite the the kind of sluggishness of the
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  economy and problems with the NHS, immigration has leapt ahead
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  once again to be the biggest single worry that people have.
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  So obviously he's he's tapping into that.
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  I mean, but obviously this has been building up for years and
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  years and years. I mean, you know, we, we could
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  go back to 1997 when we saw a step change in, in rates of
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  immigration and that. And then then of course, we had
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  Brexit, which is partly driven by by immigration, the feeling
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  that free movement was too free in a way that people could come
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  here and immediately enjoy all the rights of a British citizen.
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  We had 2019 with, you know, a promise of, you know, getting
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  Brexit done and, and levelling up and, and controlling
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  immigration because we now, you know, we're no longer in the EU,
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  we could control it and, and that didn't happen.
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  Indeed, we had a huge increase in legal migration.
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  So we now have kind of the worst world.
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  We have huge, huge legal migration.
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  Obviously it's come down quite a lot in in the last year or so,
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  but we were up to absolutely, you know, extraordinary levels
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  sort of seven 800,000 a year. And and we have the combined
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  with that we have the escalating channel issue let.
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  Me, let me bring in Jacqueline McKenzie then here.
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  Because that's the point, isn't it?
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  Successive governments have failed on this and now Nigel
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  Farage steps in and says hey, I can fix it.
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  No wonder people are listening. Overwhelmingly, people are still
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  more concerned about, you know, their their lives, you know what
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  money they have in their pocket, whether they're going to be able
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  to access health care, whether. They're not.
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  They're now more concerned about immigration, aren't they?
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  Well. Well, I haven't seen any formal
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  opinion polls on this, but we do know in the last election it
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  counted as something quite low down the priority list.
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  Now I I accept that it has risen.
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  I don't know where it is in terms of, you know, actual
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  opinion poll information. Top concern according to you Gov
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  The last opinion poll and now it's now far ahead of the
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  economy in the NHS and that's the point.
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  Nigel Farage is responding to that.
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  Then I think then that's fair enough.
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  But I think we do have to ask how have we come to a position
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  where, you know, 100,000 people seeking asylum and there weren't
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  100,000 people crossing the Channel, but 100,000 people are
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  seeking asylum because not everybody crosses the Channel.
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  You know, people come in in other ways.
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  How is it that that number of people when we know there are
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  120 million people displaced around the world?
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  You know, we saw Bangladesh taking a million Rohingyas,
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  Colombia took in 2 million Venezuelans, etcetera, etcetera.
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  How is it that that number of people, which is relatively a
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  small number, certainly less than France and Germany takes in
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  and when you think we're the 5th largest economy, how is it that
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  that has become the main talking point it it is a 40?
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  646% rise on the same period last year.
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  Have come across the channel in small boats this year so it's a
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  big rise isn't it? It's a big, it is a huge rise
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  and it's because, and it's not the highest number.
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  We've had higher numbers before and people came in in different
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  ways, didn't they came in via lorry and under the Eurostar in
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  all manner of ways. But this is highly visible.
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  People are coming in in these small boats.
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  You know, politicians, organisations, some sections of
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  the media make a big thing of it and they instill fear.
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  But you think the UK should be able to absorb and and and
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  tolerate that level? I think the numbers are small
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  enough for us to be able to do that.
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  I do accept that there are issues across society.
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  There was a lack, you know, I've been a school governor.
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  I mean, there are real pressures on school places, there's
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  pressure on the NHS and so forth.
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  But whose fault is it? Is it the small number of people
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  who come over in those boats? And when I say a small number, a
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  small number in comparison to numbers of people fleeing
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  persecution for whatever reason, even I accept that some people
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  just want a better life. Let me put that back to let me
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  put that back to David. It's a small number in the
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  scheme of things. Yeah.
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  I mean, it is a relatively small number, but it's the visibility
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  of the channel crossings. I mean, I agree that only about
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  I think about getting on for 1/2 of asylum applications come from
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  Channel crosses. I mean the rest are there are
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  still people coming in on lorries and there are also a lot
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  of people who overstay visas, people who've come in legally
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  and then claim asylum subsequently.
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  But I do think, I mean, there is a growing consensus now across
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  left and right, across the whole of Europe that our laws that
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  were that were designed for a different world.
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  You know, the 1951 convention, the European Convention on Human
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  Rights, which which adds various other restrictions that make it
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  harder to deport people or stop them coming in the 1st place.
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  These were designed for a world in which very few people moved.
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  But let me put that to Jacqueline.
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  Well, some would argue that Refugee Convention is not fit
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  for purpose, but for a different reason.
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  Because there is going to be an argument for people coming here
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  for reasons outside the convention, IE because they
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  cannot survive economically, or because of climate justice, or
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  for all manner of reasons in their current states.
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  And very often they're moving to countries which have contributed
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  to some of the problems in their own.
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  David. I mean, I think, you know, most
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  people in rich countries do not regard themselves as as
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  responsible for colonialism or imperialism.
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  You know, that is now many, many, many generations back.
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  No, I mean, I think, you know, do you want a kind of balanced
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  evolution of the planet? Do you want balanced
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  development? Do you know if you do, if you
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  don't want everybody ending up in Shepherd's Bush or or
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  Brooklyn, then we need to control this process.
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  I agree that rich countries should be, you know, generous.
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  They should. They should create systems that
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  do allow those people who are genuinely facing persecution.
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  I mean, there are many authoritarian regimes in the
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  world and, you know, there are many, you know, opposition
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  leaders who find themselves, you know, with a bullet in the head
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  in a South African hotel, I mean.
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  David, David, you talk about being generous.
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  Nigel Farage is talking about paying autocratic regimes.
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  He's talking about dismantling Britain's post war treaties and
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  fundamental rights, locking up women and children.
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  I mean, is this who we are as a country?
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  Well, I think, you know, it's a response to the facts.
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  You know, it's a response to this, as I say this, this sort
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  of collision of the extraordinary high level, high
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  level of legal immigration and of the the very high visibility.
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  And I don't just mean the visibility crossing the channel.
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  I mean, I think, you know, that the, the fact that it's the,
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  it's the, the hotel in the town where people had their wedding
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  anniversary and you know, that the, I mean, it's just through
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  it. It does seem an extraordinary
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  mistake in a way on the part of the political class to think
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  that you could just stick a whole lot of, you know, young
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  men from Afghanistan or wherever in a hotel in the middle of a
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  small town like Epping and nobody would kind of notice.
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  And Jacqueline, you know, allegations against male asylum
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  seekers have fuelled discontent and that's legitimate, isn't it?
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  I mean, of course, I mean, you know, if there are sex offenders
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  anywhere, you know, amongst asylum seekers, amongst
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  refugees, amongst the indigenous British population, amongst
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  white men, then of course that is legitimate cause for concern.
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  There does seem to be some evidence that there are some
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  foreign national groups where crime, particularly sex crime
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  is, is higher than the existing male population.
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  You'd kind of expect that. I mean, that's sort of, you
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  know, people coming from very, very traditional societies with
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  very different attitudes to women suddenly find themselves
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  in society where, you know, in in London with, you know, women
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  not wearing very many clothes in the hot weather.
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  This is kind of, you know, this is not what they're used to.
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  And some some men these places that are behaving very bad.
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  Well, I mean, I mean, that's so dangerous.
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  I mean, that's so dangerous. You know, to castigate the
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  entire group was castigating an entire group of people.
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  And in fact, in the in the statistics that was put out
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  recently by Ministry of Justice and confirmed by the Home Office
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  about who it is that's in prison.
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  You know, when there was this discussion about foreign
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  national prisoners of which we found, you know, there were 3 to
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  4000 of them. You know, we found that and,
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  and, and very often and this discussion about communities and
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  culture. And so we're often talking about
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  Muslim men or Asian men, particularly South Asian men.
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  And we found that they are underrepresented.
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  Of all the groups, they were the most underrepresented in the
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  prison population. So yes, there are problems in
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  that community. There's absolutely no doubt
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  about it. We sat and watched the stories
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  about grooming in Rotherham and Oldham and Bolton.
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  But we but we can't go around accusing entire communities.
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  We can't. We just can't do that.
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  I'm not doing that. I mean, but it's certainly not
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  the case that Muslim men are not under represented in British
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  prisons. It may be the Indian men are
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  Chinese men. The term was Asian men, the.
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  I, I don't think, well, we're not going to agree on this.
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  I mean, I think we need to go back to this original question
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  of, you know, how open rich Western societies should be.
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  And I think we should be generous when it comes to taking
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  certain proportion of people every year who are, who have
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  suffered as a result of natural disasters or or war.
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  There are there are hundreds of thousands or millions of people
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  in UNHCR camps, but we need to select them, we need to select
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  the most vulnerable people. But but, David, let me just put
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  to you, there's an uncomfortable echo of the language of the
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  1970s, you know, the National Front poster from the 1970s that
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  said make Britain great again, stop immigration, start
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  repatriation. I mean, is this where we've
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  moved as a country now? Well, it's, it's responding to a
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  very different universe. We remain, you know, you know,
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  there is a very, I mean, Jacqueline didn't seem to be
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  aware of this. But as you pointed out, I mean,
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  it is now the most important issue for people despite the the
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  weakness of the economy and we are we're worrying about a real
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  thing. I mean, it's that.
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  Whipped up by Farage, actually, because I mean it, it does seem
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  slightly bizarre that given the cost of living, you know, high
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  inflation etcetera, people are worrying more about this than,
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  you know, the pound in their pocket.
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  Well, yes, I mean, you know, politicians, you know, who have
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  thrived off a certain approach, you know, and Nigel Farage has
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  done very well by emphasizing the two things that are
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  political class have kind of most ignored among the British
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  public. One of them is one of them is
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  immigration and the other is national sovereignty.
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  That is how he has done very well.
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  And why, why would he stop now? But I want to just make this
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  point comparing us now to the 1970s.
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  We're a miles more liberal country.
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  I mean, the number of people in Britain who say you have to be
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  white to be truly British is something like 5 or 6%.
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  You know, the number of people of different subject.
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  But I mean, again, an indicator of our kind of liberalism.
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  The number of people who say, you know, a man should go out to
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  work and a woman should stay at home and and look after the
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  household and children is also about about 5%.
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  A very, very liberal country. Let's put that to Jacqueline.
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  You know we've changed 1,000,000 miles from the 1970s.
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  You know, people who say the far right is now mainstream.
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  It's just not true. I mean, I think, you know, my
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  parents are first generation Windrush and you know, I grew up
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  hearing the stories and of course I work mainly with with
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  Windrush clients. You know, I've grown up hearing
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  the stories about no blacks, no dogs, no Irish.
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  It's quite part of our popular culture.
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  So, you know, absolutely things have changed from then.
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  But what I fear now is that things are going back there.
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  You know, I worry for my teenage son being out at night.
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  You know, we see graffiti even on my street, which is in an
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  area which is, you know, a very cohesive area, not ever seen any
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  racist graffiti. My daughter pointed out
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  something that had been written on a on a telephone pole a few
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  months ago and how saddened she was.
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  You know, she's second generation born in the UK.
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  So I think we're heading back into really worrying times and
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  also that this is being caused a lot by politicians and by
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  sections of the media and of course by some organisations.
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  Because, you know, you're absolutely right and David is
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  absolutely right that on the other side of that coin are some
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  incredible, wonderful positive signs.
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  You know, up and down the country are hundreds of
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  organisations, mostly run by elderly white women in their
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  villages and communities running refugee support and welcoming
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  organisations, you know, providing meals and blankets and
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  things. We see some great stuff.
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  But David, I mean, you know, just hearing those stories from
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  Jacqueline, you know, a recent migrant or a migrant of long
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  standing is going to find some of this language very upsetting,
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  possibly even terrifying. And that's let alone the the
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  refugees who've come in and find people camped outside their hot
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  their hotels. Yeah, I mean, but then I mean,
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  I, I agree with Jacqueline. I I have black and Asian friends
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  who say that they have for the first time, you know, been the
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  subject of bad mouthing, racist, bad mouthing.
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  And. But, you know, the issue is, you
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  know, do we, do we actually respond?
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  I mean, we've had a democratic failure here.
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  We're emboldening that tiny number of people.
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  I mean, I don't think it's even 5%, but it's a kind of fraction
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  of those 5% of people, you know, who are racist nutters.
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  You have them in all societies at all times.
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  You know, very small number of people who you know, for
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  whatever reason feel very insecure about their, about
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  their status in society or whatever.
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  But, you know, do we we're emboldening those people by not
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  responding to the by by our democracy, not responding to the
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  completely legitimate demand of the vast majority of people for
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  slower, slower change, slower immigration. 25 years ago in the
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  year 2000, the white British population was about 90% of the
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  British population. It is now closer to 70%.
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  We've seen a huge demographic change and that and that, you
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  know, in in many towns and cities and suburbs, you know
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  that that has, you know, it has completely changed.
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  But do you, do you mind about that?
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  I mean. What's the problem?
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  I think that's an enormous problem to to a lot of people.
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  People, human beings, tend to prefer familiarity and security.
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  It's just racist. Isn't it?
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  They are not. No, no, absolutely not.
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  No, people are, people are and, and I think the language is
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  often sort of twisted here. People are not anti immigrant,
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  they are anti mass immigration. They are anti radical change to
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  their to their way of life to you know, if suddenly your
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  neighborhood fills up with people who have very different
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  attitudes to religion to you, who speak a different language
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  to you, you may not feel uncomfortable.
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  Lots of lots of our fellow citizens do feel.
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  Jacqueline is that is that. Is that a?
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  Legitimate concern, that's not. No, I think that.
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  I mean, I think that worries me greatly that anyone feels like
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  that. You know, I mean, my mother
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  lives in a tiny island called Grenada in the Caribbean, and we
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  have a lot of English people going there because it's sunny
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  and you can buy property quite cheap.
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  You know, we've got people coming in from China and all
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  over the world. And it all makes for a wonderful
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  sort of, you know, you know, a cohesive community.
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  I mean, we are part of the world.
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  Look at the United States. Look at Canada, most of you,
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  most of the world, wherever you have a homogeneous society, a
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  society that most of us would not want to live in.
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  Who wants to live in North Korea, where almost 99% of the
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  population is North Korean? It is wonderful that you know
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  you can eat your way around the world in the UK and that your
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  neighbors can be from anywhere. We learn from that.
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  Do some cultures bring practices with them that make some of us
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  feel uncomfortable? Absolutely they do.
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  Jacqueline Mackenzie, David Goodhart, thank you both very
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  much for joining us. Well, that is it for this
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  episode of THE FORECAST. Until next time, goodbye.