A sitting Conservative MP has introduced a bill that would make lawful residents deportable for earning under £38,700 - and Britain’s political class is barely blinking.
As someone married to a filipino who is living and working in the UK on a spouse visa and due to apply for ILR next year, this bill has rendered me both absolutely livid and worried sick for both my wife and my future in this country.
We already have to meet the MIR, pay application fees (£1035 per application) IHS fees (£1024 per year, up front with the application fee), ILR will cost £3029 (assuming it doesn't go up next April). On top of tax, ni, corporation tax, VAT etc. But my wife doesn't earn anywhere near the proposed cutoff so all of that would be void if this bill became law.
The only hope have at the moment is that in theory it will not get near becoming law, but the lack of condemnation from labour, makes me doubt that hope
hope.
The fact that such a Bill has even been proposed leaves me utterly devastated and disgusted.
This is NOT the United Kingdom I grew up in and had been so proud to be a citizen of unto recent years.
The fight to kick out (or prevent more from coming) any non-white, non-Christian adjacent people from the UK has reached levels that I didn't think possible from a country that I looked up to as an example of multiculturalism.
My application for British citizenship is on hold as I had mixed feelings about going ahead based on fear instead of love for this country after 16 years here. Unfortunately, given the turn of events, I'm afraid the first will be the prevailing driver of me getting a British passport and it makes me terribly sad.
Things aren't looking much rosier in Europe and the discourse around immigration is very similar in most countries at the moment, so one feels a bit hopeless about what the future may hold.
This would be ignorant cruelty on the part of anyone - but from a child of refugees? Deplorable. And as you say, 'The Lam bill is not only morally completely deranged, but economically suicidal.'
I do try not to use bad language, but some of your posts just seem to get my goat. No, not the greatest of all time list, tho now I think about it, maybe there should be a GOAT list for all the “fuckwit” types like said MP referenced within. Maybe. 🤔
This subject is very close my heart as my daughter is married to an Australian and they have 2 beautiful children and a home of their own. Her husband has secured ILR but this current “cruelty initiative” has left them both numb, given that as a hospitality worker the earnings threshold applies to him in a negative way. I keep suggesting to them that this “cruelty initiative” will not happen for reasons the Bear has stated e.g the collapse of some sectors of the economy but it doesn’t stop them worrying and I mean “really” worrying about their future life together as a family unit. One point that perhaps hasn’t been considered by the gaslighters is the relationship between the “cruelty initiative” and the commonwealth. Where does the crown as the head of the commonwealth stand in the debate, and what would be the effect if all those countries involved in receiving some of their nationals from the U.K. decide to reciprocate? As usual the devil is in the details, and headline grabbing devils never look at the detail!
So, I assume when people reach retirement age and income drops, people are shown the exit. People who have 'contributed' for 10, 20, 30 years or more. 'Price of everything, value of nothing' keeps popping into my head.
To be fair - I mean about as fair as I can be - Lam is in a Reform area (and aren't they doing a grand job in Kent County Council), so she's clear;y aiming this at her constituents and trying to keep her seat. It's not policy, it's desperation.
Enough people have pointed out the irony of grandparents on both sides being immigrants, but it isn't just irony it's sheer selfish disregard of what's going on.
Although I get criticism for this, I do think immigration needs to be managed. We then need to have some idea about what we mean by 'managed', and how we also manage the implications. Yes, there are issues such as housing and education to be taken into account, but as The Bear points out, the NHS would be on its knees without immigration. It's a complex policy area - a Rubik cube for realm life - and one that will never be sorted by slogan.
And can the Conservative Party - the party that with absolutely no sense of irony has members who claim to be 'the party of the family' - really be quite so happy about splitting up families? Probably, based on the current membership.
I realised recently that I've yet to complete my form for a postal vote for forthcoming elections. I suspect that may be because I can't imagine being able to vote for anybody these days - and I'm a man who always votes. My optimistic side says that idiot racists are a noisy minority with brilliant PR - about there are a lot more decent people than that. Unfortunately, the Labour Party seems more bothered about not upsetting the far right. The party seems to have forgotten that people only lend their votes, and at the moment I wouldn't trust Labour to boil a kettle, let alone do the right thing with my vote.
But look what happened in US a third of people didn’t vote. I realise people will think Labour has let them down but I for one will vote tactically to keep Reform out (🤞it’s Lib Dem’s, Green or Lab & not Tories)
I know - and that's what I think is the real problem. When governments talk about mandates when what they mean is 'people thought we were the least worst', they end up not doing them any favours. And now, when both the Conservative Party and the Labour Party are encroaching on Reform territory, the options are diminishing. (I have some issues with the Greens, both locally and nationally, so it's all a bit of a nightmare.)
Ah Bear, we must all bow down to the great god Capitalism and his high priests Productivity, Parsimony and Profit. Nothing else has really mattered for years now. We are, I fear, approaching our civilisation's end times. The Rapture will not be televised.
Clearly, the likes of Lam really don't have much in the intelligence department. They've no common sense either, as you point out, certain very necessary services rely on the people they are discriminating against. It's my hope that one day, we will get politicians with a level of both intelligence and common sense, along with integrity and decency, those talents are sadly lacking at the moment in an awful lot of mp's.
I also wonder if the abolition of ILR is merely a populist tactic to enhance government powers of control over the people (which I consider are pretty huge and enshrined in the law already).
"Her paternal grandfather's family is of Dutch Jewish descent and her paternal grandmother's family were from Germany and included a left-wing senator representing Saxony. Her grandmother's family moved to England to escape political persecution. Most of her grandfather's family was killed in the Holocaust. Her father's parents met while delivering leaflets for the Labour Party in the 1940s."
I bet they're turning in their graves, poor souls.
How can someone so keen on cultural congestion posess so little herself?
This article made me cry, Bear. The trouble is, once one aspect of the Human Rights Act is removed, it becomes easier to remove other parts. The proposed Bill by Lam would seek to “make Britain White Again” but we would lose so much in terms of diversity - different voices, integration of different cultures and the general richness of British life. Your own contribution to our country is invaluable but they want to put a price on it.
But where would it stop? What happens when natural born citizens become “economically inactive” (a phrase I have always hated, those of us who don’t work - and not through choice - still pay VAT on goods and services, spend money in the local economy, pay council tax and so on) or earn less than £38,000 a year? Even when I was a Band Six nurse, I didn’t earn that much. And people in lower paid jobs are often the essential workers - look at who we relied on during Covid. Supermarket staff, post offices, cleaners, porters, nurses, teachers.
When one’s value as a human being is linked to their productivity and their annual salary, any kind of humanity is erased. We are numbers on a spreadsheet, not people with hopes and dreams and families we love and who love us.
Since when did the cruelty become the point?
I pray that this never ever becomes law, and that everyone who has paid through the nose to come to the UK legally can rest easy and know you are all valued because of who you are, not by what you do.
I feel everything is about politics now and nothing is about reality. It’s also defined by FPTP and our cruddy system. What was once shocking is now mainstream. Still they keep upping the ante. Cruelly disregarding its impact. Scapegoat after scapegoat, First EU, then refugees, now those with IDR and ignoring even the Rule of Law, who next? I cannot stand this. They’re out of control. What kind of world are they creating? Who next? I’ve heard people wanting to deport protestors recently. It’s as if all common sense is gone. But as it escalates it’s destabilising the country. Where will it end? I genuinely worry about that. I am absolutely beyond angry at the cruelty, stupidity and selfishness of Conservatives, Labour and Reform.
As someone married to a filipino who is living and working in the UK on a spouse visa and due to apply for ILR next year, this bill has rendered me both absolutely livid and worried sick for both my wife and my future in this country.
We already have to meet the MIR, pay application fees (£1035 per application) IHS fees (£1024 per year, up front with the application fee), ILR will cost £3029 (assuming it doesn't go up next April). On top of tax, ni, corporation tax, VAT etc. But my wife doesn't earn anywhere near the proposed cutoff so all of that would be void if this bill became law.
The only hope have at the moment is that in theory it will not get near becoming law, but the lack of condemnation from labour, makes me doubt that hope
hope.
The fact that such a Bill has even been proposed leaves me utterly devastated and disgusted.
This is NOT the United Kingdom I grew up in and had been so proud to be a citizen of unto recent years.
O the irony... How long will it be before some unpleasant people are demanding that the children of immigrants have to leave as well?
And of course the MP proposing this legislation is the child of wartime refugees.
Thing is, like the stuff from Patel and Badenoch, it's only ever meant to apply to "others" and not themselves.
I think that's an utterly appalling response from Labour. They need to stop pandering to the right-wing group who will never vote for them.
The fight to kick out (or prevent more from coming) any non-white, non-Christian adjacent people from the UK has reached levels that I didn't think possible from a country that I looked up to as an example of multiculturalism.
My application for British citizenship is on hold as I had mixed feelings about going ahead based on fear instead of love for this country after 16 years here. Unfortunately, given the turn of events, I'm afraid the first will be the prevailing driver of me getting a British passport and it makes me terribly sad.
Things aren't looking much rosier in Europe and the discourse around immigration is very similar in most countries at the moment, so one feels a bit hopeless about what the future may hold.
What a sickening slide. I despair.
This would be ignorant cruelty on the part of anyone - but from a child of refugees? Deplorable. And as you say, 'The Lam bill is not only morally completely deranged, but economically suicidal.'
I do try not to use bad language, but some of your posts just seem to get my goat. No, not the greatest of all time list, tho now I think about it, maybe there should be a GOAT list for all the “fuckwit” types like said MP referenced within. Maybe. 🤔
This subject is very close my heart as my daughter is married to an Australian and they have 2 beautiful children and a home of their own. Her husband has secured ILR but this current “cruelty initiative” has left them both numb, given that as a hospitality worker the earnings threshold applies to him in a negative way. I keep suggesting to them that this “cruelty initiative” will not happen for reasons the Bear has stated e.g the collapse of some sectors of the economy but it doesn’t stop them worrying and I mean “really” worrying about their future life together as a family unit. One point that perhaps hasn’t been considered by the gaslighters is the relationship between the “cruelty initiative” and the commonwealth. Where does the crown as the head of the commonwealth stand in the debate, and what would be the effect if all those countries involved in receiving some of their nationals from the U.K. decide to reciprocate? As usual the devil is in the details, and headline grabbing devils never look at the detail!
So, I assume when people reach retirement age and income drops, people are shown the exit. People who have 'contributed' for 10, 20, 30 years or more. 'Price of everything, value of nothing' keeps popping into my head.
To be fair - I mean about as fair as I can be - Lam is in a Reform area (and aren't they doing a grand job in Kent County Council), so she's clear;y aiming this at her constituents and trying to keep her seat. It's not policy, it's desperation.
Enough people have pointed out the irony of grandparents on both sides being immigrants, but it isn't just irony it's sheer selfish disregard of what's going on.
Although I get criticism for this, I do think immigration needs to be managed. We then need to have some idea about what we mean by 'managed', and how we also manage the implications. Yes, there are issues such as housing and education to be taken into account, but as The Bear points out, the NHS would be on its knees without immigration. It's a complex policy area - a Rubik cube for realm life - and one that will never be sorted by slogan.
And can the Conservative Party - the party that with absolutely no sense of irony has members who claim to be 'the party of the family' - really be quite so happy about splitting up families? Probably, based on the current membership.
I realised recently that I've yet to complete my form for a postal vote for forthcoming elections. I suspect that may be because I can't imagine being able to vote for anybody these days - and I'm a man who always votes. My optimistic side says that idiot racists are a noisy minority with brilliant PR - about there are a lot more decent people than that. Unfortunately, the Labour Party seems more bothered about not upsetting the far right. The party seems to have forgotten that people only lend their votes, and at the moment I wouldn't trust Labour to boil a kettle, let alone do the right thing with my vote.
But look what happened in US a third of people didn’t vote. I realise people will think Labour has let them down but I for one will vote tactically to keep Reform out (🤞it’s Lib Dem’s, Green or Lab & not Tories)
I know - and that's what I think is the real problem. When governments talk about mandates when what they mean is 'people thought we were the least worst', they end up not doing them any favours. And now, when both the Conservative Party and the Labour Party are encroaching on Reform territory, the options are diminishing. (I have some issues with the Greens, both locally and nationally, so it's all a bit of a nightmare.)
Ah Bear, we must all bow down to the great god Capitalism and his high priests Productivity, Parsimony and Profit. Nothing else has really mattered for years now. We are, I fear, approaching our civilisation's end times. The Rapture will not be televised.
Guessing it's time to stand up & be counted - French style.
Clearly, the likes of Lam really don't have much in the intelligence department. They've no common sense either, as you point out, certain very necessary services rely on the people they are discriminating against. It's my hope that one day, we will get politicians with a level of both intelligence and common sense, along with integrity and decency, those talents are sadly lacking at the moment in an awful lot of mp's.
It evokes a sense of despair in my fellow human.
Has it always been like this? Just kept quiet? I fear that may be the case but also feel poorer for being a citizen of this polity.
I also wonder if the abolition of ILR is merely a populist tactic to enhance government powers of control over the people (which I consider are pretty huge and enshrined in the law already).
From her Wikipedia entry:
"Her paternal grandfather's family is of Dutch Jewish descent and her paternal grandmother's family were from Germany and included a left-wing senator representing Saxony. Her grandmother's family moved to England to escape political persecution. Most of her grandfather's family was killed in the Holocaust. Her father's parents met while delivering leaflets for the Labour Party in the 1940s."
I bet they're turning in their graves, poor souls.
How can someone so keen on cultural congestion posess so little herself?
Not "congestion", but tradition... Maybe the autocorrect knows something I don't
This article made me cry, Bear. The trouble is, once one aspect of the Human Rights Act is removed, it becomes easier to remove other parts. The proposed Bill by Lam would seek to “make Britain White Again” but we would lose so much in terms of diversity - different voices, integration of different cultures and the general richness of British life. Your own contribution to our country is invaluable but they want to put a price on it.
But where would it stop? What happens when natural born citizens become “economically inactive” (a phrase I have always hated, those of us who don’t work - and not through choice - still pay VAT on goods and services, spend money in the local economy, pay council tax and so on) or earn less than £38,000 a year? Even when I was a Band Six nurse, I didn’t earn that much. And people in lower paid jobs are often the essential workers - look at who we relied on during Covid. Supermarket staff, post offices, cleaners, porters, nurses, teachers.
When one’s value as a human being is linked to their productivity and their annual salary, any kind of humanity is erased. We are numbers on a spreadsheet, not people with hopes and dreams and families we love and who love us.
Since when did the cruelty become the point?
I pray that this never ever becomes law, and that everyone who has paid through the nose to come to the UK legally can rest easy and know you are all valued because of who you are, not by what you do.
I feel everything is about politics now and nothing is about reality. It’s also defined by FPTP and our cruddy system. What was once shocking is now mainstream. Still they keep upping the ante. Cruelly disregarding its impact. Scapegoat after scapegoat, First EU, then refugees, now those with IDR and ignoring even the Rule of Law, who next? I cannot stand this. They’re out of control. What kind of world are they creating? Who next? I’ve heard people wanting to deport protestors recently. It’s as if all common sense is gone. But as it escalates it’s destabilising the country. Where will it end? I genuinely worry about that. I am absolutely beyond angry at the cruelty, stupidity and selfishness of Conservatives, Labour and Reform.