A Conservative MP tipped as a future party leader has been condemned for saying large numbers of legally settled families must be deported, in order to ensure the UK is mostly “culturally coherent”.
The Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch, has been urged to condemn the comments by Katie Lam, a Home Office shadow minister and a whip for the party. Lam was previously a special adviser to Boris Johnson and is often described as a rising star of the new intake.
Lam told the Sunday Times she believed large numbers of people with legal status in the UK would need to have their right to stay revoked and should “go home”.
She said: “There are also a large number of people in this country who came here legally, but in effect shouldn’t have been able to do so. It’s not the fault of the individuals who came here, they just shouldn’t have been able to do so.
“They will also need to go home. What that will leave is a mostly but not entirely culturally coherent group of people.”
In a letter to Badenoch, the Lib Dem leader, Ed Davey, called it “deeply concerning and unpatriotic. People who have come to the United Kingdom legally, played by the rules and made it their home do not need to ‘go home’. This is their home.”
Davey said that Lam’s suggestion of removing thousands of people who were in the UK legally “shows just how far your party has moved away from the fundamental values of decency, tolerance and respect for the rule of law that the vast majority of people in our country hold dear”.
The Liberal Democrats said the Conservatives should urgently clarify if Lam reflected the party’s position and whom the party believes “shouldn’t have been able” to come to the UK legally.
“What does ‘a mostly but not entirely culturally coherent group of people’ mean and how would this be set out in the Conservative party’s immigration rules?” the letter asks.
The position is similar to Reform UK, which has said it would scrap indefinite leave to remain (ILR) and that migrants would need to reapply for five-year visas, which would only be granted to those with high earnings.
Labour also intends to reform ILR, though it will only make it available to those who have been in the UK for 10 years and who can prove they have made a contribution to UK society, such as through volunteer work.
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