The Liberal Democrats have long prided themselves on being upholders of the rule of law and defenders of legal principles – a David standing against the philistine Trump in defence of the rules-based international order.
This plays well within the party, but it is worth asking whether this framing is as effective with the electorate as we assume. We risk misreading the national mood and how international law is understood by many voters. More importantly, our own policy positions do not always reflect the consistency that this stance implies.
Take illegal immigration, one of the most emotive issues in British politics today. Many voters see the issue in stark terms: illegal immigration is illegal, yet those arriving illegally are not prosecuted and are instead supported with accommodation and services.
While our position is that “international law … confirms that asylum seekers should not be punished for how they arrive in a country”, Article 31.1 of the Refugee Convention states:
“The Contracting States shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees who, coming directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened in the sense of Article 1, enter or are present in their territory without authorization, provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.”
This clearly does not apply to individuals arriving in the UK from France. There are, of course, sound practical and humanitarian reasons for not prosecuting such cases, but a strict commitment to the rule of law, domestic or international, is not among them. On the contrary, a commitment to the rule of law would suggest that those who break the law should face legal consequences.
The rules-based international order is not merely a collection of treaties and regulations; it depends equally on the institutions and practices that interpret and enforce them. The International Court of Justice is the world’s highest court of international law. The allegation of genocide in Gaza is one of the most high-profile cases it has considered and represents a test of its authority. Many people feel strongly about the issue, and politicians are under pressure to take positions. However, for Ed Davey to reach a verdict before the ICJ has considered the evidence does not support international law—it undermines the very institution that upholds it.
Many prominent party members have said that the United States’ recent military action against Iran is illegal. It is true that Iran did not pose an imminent threat to the United States, and that a pre-emptive strike was not necessary for self-defence. But Hitler’s invasion of Poland posed no immediate threat to the UK. Was Britain’s declaration of war on Germany also illegal?
Had Israel been a member of NATO, Iran’s April 2024 missile attacks would be sufficient to trigger Article 5, obliging allies to take action, including the use of force, in her defence. If US support for Israel in such circumstances is illegal, then the central principle of the NATO alliance itself is also illegal. This can’t be our party’s position.
Does it matter that adherence to legal principles has not always been the decisive factor in shaping our policy? In electoral terms, no. Lack of jurisprudential consistency is unlikely to cost votes. But it does matter for another reason. The broader narrative promoted by figures such as Farage is not concerned with exposing inconsistency, but with persuading voters that international law itself is an ass. That is a narrative we should be careful not to reinforce.
We have seen a similar dynamic before. The UK began adopting the metric system in 1965, and India, Australia and Canada all went metric around this period because they judged the metric system to be superior to imperial measures. However, after joining the EEC, advocates of metrication stopped making the case on its merits and relied on European regulation to push through metrication for them. Although metrication was unrelated to EU membership, the two became conflated in the public mind. The result was a post-Brexit backlash and the emergence of today’s awkward metric–imperial hybrid.
The lesson is clear. We can and should continue to defend the rules-based international order. But to do so effectively, we need to be clear-eyed about its limits, honest about where legal interpretations differ, and disciplined in how we invoke it.
Policy on illegal immigration should be grounded in the values we choose as a country, and should not appear as deferring to external obligation. We should oppose Trump’s attack on Iran not on legal grounds (indeed, a credible case can be made for its legality under international law) but because it is unwise, destabilising, and contrary to our values.
Finally, there is a wider context. Over the past quarter-century, wealth has become increasingly concentrated in fewer hands. While economic power has consolidated, international law and liberal democratic institutions have so far prevented a comparable concentration of political power. This constraint has not gone unnoticed by a new class of multi-billionaires, some of whom are actively seeking to dismantle the structures that limit their political influence.
It is right for us to resist this trend, but doing so will require more than soundbites and performative indignation. It will demand clarity, consistency, and a willingness to make the argument in ways that resonate beyond our own ranks.
* Derek Meyer was born in Johannesburg and was active in the anti-apartheid movement before moving to the UK.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
The Joy of Six 1528
Endometriosis and acetylation
Reform makes first gain from Conservatives in this by-election cycle
How Chancellor Reeves torpedoed the economy
Michael Meadowcroft: A Liberal of Intellectual Rigour and Uncommon Integrity
Geoff Reid
Tom Bailey
Leonora Scipio
Kira Collins
Daniel Walker
13 Comments
Yikes, no human is illegal bud. Maybe try ‘undocumented’ or ‘irregular’ migration? Not sure how this got past the editors.
On the subject of genocide in Gaza, it is interesting that despite the evidence being available and the acceptance by many that genocide is being carried out as I write this, we spend time quibbling over the term, while taking no action to stop it from happening. Even if it is believed not to have happened yet, must we wait until the slaughter and dispossession of the Palestinians is complete before taking action? When there is a possibility of genocide, international law and the UN’s “Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) doctrine mandate that states and the international community act immediately to prevent it. The duty to act is triggered as soon as a state becomes aware, or should have been aware, of a serious risk of genocide.
I take issue with a lot of Derek’s arguments, but right now Israel with the US is not only committing homicide (if not genocide), domicide and ecocide in great measure, but Israel is doing it, not because it was under imminent threat, but because it openly wants to destabilise and dominate the Middle East. Trump followed like a blind puppy and is now up to his neck and out of his depth.
Israel needs to be prevented through sanctions and other means from completing its well-publicised goals. Arguing about whether it is fully genocide, ecocide, domicide, educide etc now, gives them the impunity to finish the job!
Thanks for this article. I would like to comment on the points made in relation to Article 31 of the Refugee Convention.
UNHCR advises that “coming directly” means that States can treat refugees differently “if they have already settled in a country and subsequently move onwards for reasons unrelated to their need for international protection.” It emphasises that Article 31 does not support the notion that asylum must be claimed in the first safe country reached. Indeed given that the 1951 Convention was drafted at a time when air travel was inaccessible to most, and overland travel was by far the most common mode of transport, such a principle would have relieved the very States that drafted and signed the Convention of any significant obligations under it.
Moreover, even if one considers a person crossing the channel not to have come directly, the penalties which may be imposed on them cannot include exclusion from refugee status should a person be entitled to one pursuant to the definition in Article 1A(2), which according to the Home Office’s own statistics most channel-crossers are found the meet following a refugee status determination. To the extent the state chooses to impose penalties (in bad faith, having failed to create legal routes to asylum), they must be proportionate and compatible with its human rights obligations.
Thanks for this article. I would like to comment on the points made in relation to Article 31 of the Refugee Convention.
UNHCR advises that “coming directly” means that States can treat refugees differently “if they have already settled in a country and subsequently move onwards for reasons unrelated to their need for international protection.” It emphasises that Article 31 does not support the notion that asylum must be claimed in the first safe country reached. Indeed given that the 1951 Convention was drafted at a time when air travel was inaccessible to most, and overland travel was by far the most common mode of transport, such a principle would have relieved the very States that drafted and signed the Convention of any significant obligations under it.
Moreover, even if one considers a person crossing the channel not to have come directly, the penalties which may be imposed on them cannot include exclusion from refugee status should a person be entitled to one pursuant to the definition in Article 1A(2), which according to the Home Office’s own statistics most channel-crossers are found the meet following a refugee status determination.
@Sarah: I fear that objecting to the word ‘illegal’ exactly illustrates the point that Derek is making. Everyone knows what the phrase ‘illegal immigration’ means. It’s not saying that a person is illegal per se – it’s saying that a person entered the country illegally. Objecting to the word, illegal, on the basis that no human is illegal is just side-stepping the actual issue of how we deal with illegal immigration, and would just make us look completely out of touch in the eyes of the average voter who just wants the problem of illegal immigration solved, not the precise phrasing debated.
Besides, the United Nations Refugee Convention, quoted in the article, freely uses the phrase ‘illegal’ in the context of people being illegally in a country. So if we respect that convention, why shouldn’t we be able to use the same words?
@simon It’s not hard to use inclusive language. The ‘average voter’ in your framing is who? Why wouldn’t that find that offensive? Do they not know and love immigrants who may have had to arrive irregularly? Is the average voter, aka the average brit, so offended by the idea of being kind to another human? If so, they will certainly get what they deserve with reform. It’s very easy for white male passing ppl to decide what is acceptable when it doesn’t impact them, if only it were as easy for them to just stay silent.
Indeed Sarah it is not hard to use inclusive language – Just a waste of time when someone tries to divert the discussion away from something potentially productive and up the rabbit hole of changing the subject under discussion to something irrelevant to the important matter under discussion.
All it does is stopping us from discussing things effectively. While you ask questions that obstruct us from making progress, others on this site merely wonder why you are being so fussy, because it isn’t helping us at all.
Please try to be more inclusive in your acceptance of other Lib Dems choice of language.
“Everyone knows what the phrase ‘illegal immigration’ means.”
No they don’t. It used to be generally accepted that anyone from overseas is entitled to rock up to the UK, entering by any means of transport, and make an application for asylum. Illegality, on that definition, began only when an asylum claim was rejected (including any appeal) and the asylum seeker deliberately refused to leave.
More recently, UK governments have declared it illegal to rock up to the UK in a small boat or hidden in a lorry. Whether a UK government has the right to make that declaration is, as best I understand it, not at all clear.
As the late Simon Titley put it, “The average voter has one breast and one testicle.”
@Sarah @Simon Robinson. Baffling obsession with semantics. Immigration is a process. It is regulated by a number of laws, thus it may be “legal “ or “illegal” depending on whether those laws were adhered to. Here’s an idea. Let’s not call people criminals, because they are more than that, let’s call them “people who have committed crimes”. And then ask people to vote for us.
It is a misfortune that the electorate is not only so unversed in the basic requirements of international law but also unaware that if these rules are not honoured, bad things happen to others and quite possibly, perhaps further down the line, to ourselves. So, we should talk about it more.
Many of the international rules are driven by compassion for those who suffer, those who lose everything when the crockery gets broken. Since the ICJ only acts when requested to, and can take years to reach a verdict, we must be ready to take a view in the meantime. Silence in the face of gross violations of the law is likely to be seen as evasive hypocrisy. We’ve seen it, for example, in the failure to stop Israel from colonising occupied territory at the outset, over 50 years ago. A red line then could have stopped the subsequent anguish and loss of life for both Arabs and Jews. We knew the law to be explicit yet declined to act on it. The government is still being evasive and loses support as a consequence.
It is easy to dismiss what the Party says as ‘soundbites’ and ‘performative’, since it does not have the power to give its words substance. I have no problem inviting the electorate to choose between Reform’s self-indulgent grievance and our commitment to the law. If the Party gains power, it will be the time to live up to our word.
“The Liberal Democrats have long prided themselves on being upholders of the rule of law and defenders of legal principles”
We have also long prided ourselves on being upholders of compassion and human rights. Mostly those issues align, but occasionally they diverge when the Government makes bad law.
The UK made a law that said those arriving by irregular routes such as small boats, even if they immediately present themselves to the authorities to claim asylum, are “illegal”. We also choose to operate an asylum system that requires most refugees to actually physically be in the UK to claim asylum, while also refusing to grant visas for the purpose of claiming asylum – a classic Catch-22.
We could eliminate most of this “illegal” immigration, along with small boat crossings, very easily by simply introducing “safe and legal” routes and allowing asylum claims to be submitted from abroad.
Neither the Tories or Labour are willing to do this because a majority of asylum claims are eventually granted, and so this would replace illegal with legal migration. They have allowed Reform to frame migration as a bad thing and want to minimise it in all its forms, and accept a few drownings in the Channel as collateral damage.
Legality is a mutually agreed international framework. There are no absolutes, even in domestic law context and specific circunstances apply. However, I’m not a lawyer and can let the legal profession argue the point at whatever £/h.
If the UK had the strength, I would hope that it might have the will to intervene in support of a freiend as Poland in WWII and Belgium in WWI. I’d like to think that we would have intevened to stop the genocides in Rwanda, Sudan and multiple other examples. We should have intervened in Cyprus and Ukraine by treaty obligation and perhaps in support of Commonwealth country Grenada..