Defend EU Migrants Rights Now

In his first Commons statement as prime minister, Boris Johnson gave ‘unequivocally our guarantee to the 3.2 million EU nationals now living and working among us… I can assure them that, under this Government, they will have the absolute certainty for the right to live and remain.”

In less than a day, the prime minister’s official spokesperson rushed to clarify that this did not mean new legislation would be passed or proposed.  Figures in Johnson’s cabinet such as home secretary Priti Patel are outspoken about their determination to implement tougher immigration legislation.

The Tory government under Johnson will maintain the current EU Settlement Scheme, an application form for EU citizens living in Britain which they will have to complete as a means of asking for permission to stay in the country.

As campaigners and migrant groups have pointed out, the current scheme implies that migrants who for whatever reason fail to apply will lose the legal status and the residency rights that they have now. Figures suggest it is at least 2 million EU nationals who have not applied for settled status yet. In order to be given settled status, migrants have to prove they have lived in the UK for at least five years. However, in some cases people will not be able to provide all the documents required by the Home Office even if they had been UK residents for years. To make matters worse, the Home Office has quietly brought forward the deadline for applications from 30 June 2021 to 31 December 2020.

This is the perfect recipe for a repetition of the Windrush generation scandal—people who live and have contributed to this society suddenly finding themselves threatened with deportation and families torn apart.

Islamophobic and racist comments made by Johnson—which he has failed to apologise for, his public support for openly antisemitic leaders such as Viktor Orbán, and a leadership campaign on the basis of bigotry all suggest that the likelihood of these attacks on migrant rights happening is very high. So does Johnson’s commitment to establish a points-based immigration system, which would see applications being assessed according to criteria chosen by the government.

For more than three years, the lives of EU migrants—as the lives of British citizens living in EU countries—have been used as bargaining chips in the Brexit negotiation. This is a disgrace and must stop. 

Legislation should be passed now to guarantee the legal status of all EU migrants who live here without any need for them to apply. 

We defend all EU migrants’ right to stay and say that all migrants and refugees are welcome here. But at a minimum the government must:

·         Scrap the 5 year cap – every EU national resident in the UK should preserve all their current rights regardless of how long they have lived here.

·         The original deadline advertised by the Home Office to apply for settled status, 30 June 2021, should be re-established.

·         Provide real guarantees that the situation of EU nationals living in Britain will not be affected in the event of a no-deal Brexit