Author Archives: Lib Dem Immigrants

For richer, for poorer

For Valentine’s day, Lib Dem Immigrants is showcasing some canine (and feline) couples, with a serious message. Many people who’ve not had cause to find out the hard way don’t realise that mixed-nationality couples can be forbidden from living together in the UK if they don’t earn enough. We want to raise awareness of this, and we’re proud that Lib Dem policy is to oppose it. If you’re married to a British person, you should be allowed to live with them. No means-testing. For richer, for poorer. 🐾

Lina is a Dachshund from Munich, Germany; Jamie is an English Bulldog from Croydon. Jamie worries about whether Brexit will mean Lina can’t come and live with him.

Kuniko is a Shiba Inu from Kyoto, Japan. Gary is a Jack Russell Terrier from Bolton. Gary’s income is just enough for Kuniko to be allowed here — but not enough for their puppies too. They don’t know what they should do.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , , , , and | 5 Comments

Lib Dem Immigrants: Lib Dems lead the fight for a more inclusive People’s Vote

“Ministers agree to consider Lib Dem plans for new referendum”  say the headlines.

This is a victory not only for the party and our chances of stopping Brexit, but also for the millions of EU citizens in the UK and UK citizens around the world who were excluded from voting in 2016.

At Conference in Brighton in September, Lib Dem members condemned this injustice, and passed policy that EU citizens living in the UK and UK citizens abroad must be included in all future referendums.

Lib Dem Immigrants are proud that our party refuses to treat immigrants and emigrants as afterthoughts, and recognizes that wherever a person comes from, they are equally deserving of respect and representation.

We are glad that our MPs are vigorously arguing this case in their discussions with Ministers.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 3 Comments

The immigration motion still needs improvement

It has not been easy to come up with a response to the party’s immigration motion and paper.

There is much in the paper that we are very happy with; but there are also areas where we feel distinctly let down. We’re grateful to the Working Group for their positive attitude in communicating with us and doing what they could to improve the policy.

After a lot of soul-searching and discussion, we have come up with four amendments that we feel the motion needs in order to demonstrate the liberal values we share.

1. Means-testing of families

The situation now: A UK resident …

Posted in Conference and News | Tagged and | 19 Comments

Dear Vince, Please stop and think before blaming immigrants

On Wednesday, Vince Cable spoke at an Open Britain event where he talked about EU immigration being “managed” from within the EU. Later in the day he tweeted: “Fully support proposals to ensure that #Immigration is managed. Compatible with membership of #singlemarket and #EuropeanUnion. Pity his government and mine acted too late to stop disastrous #Brexit vote. But not too late to stop Brexit.” So we’ve written him this letter to tell him what we think:

Dear Vince,

We know you’re trying to help; really, we do. We know that you want the UK to stay in the EU; …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 71 Comments

The party’s immigration consultation: Liberalism deserves better

Liberal Democrat Immigrants exists to represent those members of the Liberal Democrats who have chosen to come to live in the UK from elsewhere. It also seeks to represent the interests of immigrants to the UK in general and to highlight those issues that disproportionately affect immigrants.

The challenge for Liberal Democrats should not be “how do we make a broken and inhumane system work a little bit less badly?”, but how we discard the broken system and in its place build something better, so that Britain can reclaim the reputation of an island of hope and welcome.

As you may have seen, the party is asking for members’ opinions on immigration. As Lib Dem Immigrants, we are fully committed to a liberal immigration policy. This should have been great news.

Sadly, on reading the consultation document, all that excitement faded, to be replaced with frustration at the nitpicky, timid mess of leading questions.

  • Expecting current policy and structures to be made fit for purpose with the barest of tweaks.
  • Failing to distinguish between actual problems and perceived problems — and naively assuming that addressing perceived problems with more “robust” policy will somehow placate tabloid-fuelled xenophobia. (hint: it won’t).
  • Focusing almost entirely on the benefits of immigration to the host country and barely at all on the benefits to the immigrants and their families.
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 92 Comments
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