On Question Time in Lincoln last week, a white, middle-aged man in the audience said this: “Migrants, illegal or legal, weren’t responsible for austerity. That was the Conservative government. Migrants were not responsible for Brexit. Migrants were not responsible for Liz Truss’s failure of leadership.
“And don’t forget, because of these populist policies in the 30s, a certain Adolf Hitler was elected. And if we follow the same rhetoric, the same blaming of migrants, we will go the same way.”
The three politicians on the panel – Nigel Farage (yes, again), Labour’s Jacqui Smith, now a Baroness and skills minister, and Tory MP Kevin Hollinrake – looked frozen. Smith, back when she was Home Secretary, bent to the will of the overactive anti-immigrant lobby. Hollinrake is an ardent supporter of Kemi Badenoch.
Horrible hypocrisies exposed
Their horrible hypocrisies had been exposed by someone from a demographic stereotyped as anti-immigrant and anti-woke.
Farage came back with his usual sneery, unsubstantiated guff about the threat posed by those crossing the Channel.
Since the Windrush landed in 1948, Conservatives have hysterically opposed “coloured” migration and Labour has been an unreliable ally. Rarely do today’s British politicians defend migrants. The exceptions are Lord Alf Dubbs, Jeremy Corbyn and a few others on the left.
In previous times, a few more championed incomers. When Ugandan Asians were exiled by Idi Amin, Ted Heath first tried to get other countries to share “the burden”, and then accepted us. That wrecked his political career. When I interviewed him in 1992, he said gruffly, “Uganda’s loss was our gain.” Labour’s Michael Foot, Fenner Brockway, Tony Benn and Joan Lester constantly sided with immigrants and refugees.
Today, the air we all breathe is filled with xenophobia. Reform UK is gaining support and spooking the established parties. Instead of confronting this nasty creation of Farage, they acquiesce to what Reform supporters want. Which is no migration, never ever, and the expulsion of people they deem “foreign”, “unworthy” and dangerous. I bet if white folks fled Zimbabwe because they were discriminated against or targeted unfairly, Reform leaders would throw a big wobbly and become their avid supporters.
Mob fear and loathing
Ambitious black and Asian public figures spur the mob fear and loathing of incomers. Zia Yusuf, the son of Sri Lankan immigrants, is now Reform’s chairman. This week, Kemi Badenoch’s denunciations of migration at Prime Minister’s Questions were both revolting and revealing.
Her highly educated, pregnant mother came to Britain to give birth, meaning her child would get British citizenship. All right for some, I guess. But not for Mona, a Syrian asylum seeker who gave birth soon after she arrived on a boat last year. Her application is on hold now because Keir Starmer’s Government is cynically using Bashar al-Assad’s overthrow as an alibi.
Our state institutions would barely function without migrants and their progeny; the business world relies on global talent and innovative skills; so too science, and medicine. Imagine what would happen to the arts, design and media if those sectors decided to exclude all those deemed un-British, whatever that means. Or if the food sector was similarly compelled to provide only traditional British fare. How many Reform enthusiasts could live without their curries and imported beers?
This nation’s pleasures and desires, needs and wants, rely on migrant flexibility, inventiveness and hard, hard work. I am frequently asked to show some gratitude to this country. I will when true Britons show some appreciation of what we incomers have done and do for them and the nation.
Repulsive
Instead of confronting the deceit, lies and jingoism of the far right, politicians of all persuasions, abetted by elements of the media, genuflect to it and vulgarly ask us to “understand” how people are feeling in today’s world. I have heard apologists suggesting the summer rioters are living hopeless lives. Oh yes? More hopeless than the asylum seekers in the buildings they tried to burn down? Or the migrant office cleaners exploited by employers? I feel no sympathy for xenophobes. They repulse me.
In 2012, Labour’s Fiona Mactaggart uttered these true, brave words: “There is another lesson for us. The moral panic that led to the Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1968… is very similar to some of the things that we hear today about asylum seekers, refugees and immigrants… We must stand up for what is right, and for matters of principle. We must resist the siren calls of hatred. We must tell people that Britain is a successful country because it is a tolerant country and because we have so many different races and traditions that are able to contribute so well to our success and our future.”
Who on the front benches dares to say that today?
Moving Forward
Sara Sharif’s father and step-mother are convicted of her murder. Millions of us feel not relief, but immeasurable sorrow and uncontainable fury. Why did nobody rescue this tortured child? Why was she handed to the father with his history of violence against females? How many children have to die before it stops? When will institutions and cultures stop believing that a child can be pitilessly chastised? Churchmen John Smyth did it to young boys.
Sara’s Muslim Pakistani family believed they had the right to make her suffer till she was “good”. Which she never could be for them. She was too “sassy”, apparently, not obedient.
Our Asian cultures still punish girls and women who are defiant and assertive. Sara’s malevolent and brutal killer says he “lost it” and went “too far”, still believing that the physical punishment of minors is permissible. That leads me to the biggest, most important questions: Why does the law allow adults to hit a child but not an adult? When will that iniquity change?
A conversation I had this week
I was chatting to and laughing with several female friends at a Christmas party when a man approached me. He said something like this: “I know you. Don’t agree with anything you say. Nothing. Don’t know why they have you on.”
I replied: “You don’t know me. I don’t care what you think of my views. They have me on and not you. Does that drive you mad? You don’t have to watch or listen to me. Now walk away. You’re spoiling my evening.”
He smiled wickedly: “You have a big mouth. Women like you turn me on.” What a dick.
Yasmin’s pick
Channel 4’s The School that Banned Smartphones is the most disturbing and important programme currently on TV. You watch what happens to the addicted kids, how lost they feel. And then realise what lies ahead.
Those fairytale child lurers – pied pipers and witches – have been replaced by real tech bros who are turning the world’s kids into zombies. And nobody can stop them. Terrifying.
This is In Conversation with Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, a subscriber-only newsletter from i. If you’d like to get this direct to your inbox, every single week, you can sign up here.
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