Recording of
CLS Sunday Zoom 5 October 2025

• Jacqueline McKenzie Partner at human rights law firm, Leigh Day, and the Head of its Immigration and Asylum Team
• Nadine Finch Honorary Senior Policy Fellow, University of Bristol

 

A Prime Minister who refers to Britain as an “Island of Strangers” and prioritises deportation and tightening immigration controls has made a choice. He has decided to ignore international humanitarian law and appease right wing populism. He has also turned his back on a significant proportion of his own voters.

The UK Government is targeting migrant workers and students. There is a Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill being debated in the House of Lords. But the Government has also chosen to use the recent White Paper on Restoring Control over the Immigration System to govern by “executive order” Trump style. Over the Summer, it has drip feed anti-migrant amendments to the Immigration Rules to the media.

This plays into the hands of extreme right wingers like Nigel Farage and Tommy Robinson.

Caribbean Labour Solidarity recently supported a picket of the Home Office in London, called by the RMT and PCS trade unions, to protest at the threat to deport some of their members due to changes in the visa regulations. Nearly 200 Transport for London (TfL) and London Underground staff, many of them long-serving and unionised, now face deportation simply because their jobs have been reclassified as “unskilled.”

RMT has pledged to take a political campaign directly to the Mayor and the government, and if necessary will take industrial action to support their workmates. CLS will continue to support their campaign.