From Sajid Javid to Shabana Mahmood, ethnic minority politicians have increasingly fronted restrictive border policies, revealing how race and political legitimacy intersect in the UK’s immigration debate.
Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at Aston University, Birmingham.
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When Sajid Javid remarked that he would not allow people like his own parents to enter the United Kingdom today, he was not making an offhand comment. He was articulating a view that has become increasingly central to British immigration politics. The UK’s first ethnic minority home secretary said he opposed admitting unskilled workers and those who do not speak English. By his own criteria, neither his father, who arrived as an unskilled worker, nor his mother, who did not speak English, would have been permitted to settle in the country. Promoting his memoir, The Colour of Time, Javid was unambiguous: immigration must fall, English-language requirements should be tougher, and entry should be limited to skilled workers.
