How will immigration policy shape the 2024 UK General Election campaign? SSAHE webinar

Intense public debates about the shape and direction of immigration have been a constant feature of British political life for several decades. They are likely to be at the forefront during the forthcoming election campaign. This webinar will address key policy issues and civil society responses to them.
Themes of ‘managed migration’, the creation of a ‘hostile environment’, the rolling back of the free movement rights associated with the European Union movement, and now the threat of withdrawal from international human rights instruments have set the framework for policy development since the turn of the millennium. The direction of policy has been towards a weakening of the applicability of human and civil rights to the position of migrants in order to enhance the state’s capacity for control of numbers. Despite this, what has actually been delivered is a system of immigration control which has failed to secure the level of management of migration demanded by the mainstream political parties.

Another feature of the current situation is the emergence of a large – though still minority – segment of public opinion which rejects the injustices of the hostile environment, unfair treatment of asylum seekers, the increase in the exploitation of migrant workers, and the evidence of institutional racism, seeing this as outcomes of a rightward policy drift.

How will these factors shape public consideration of immigration as the country embarks on a long general election campaign? Will it award victory to the party prepared to go furthest in its demands for a restrictive regime of tight controls? Alternatively, could the moods supporting the current resurgence of the centre-left parties put a stop to the anti-migration trend and bring about a re-evaluation of where policy might go?
In this webinar we will hear the views of researchers, professionals, and activists on these matters.

Professor Eleonore Kofman, Middlesex University
Sonali Naik, Barrister, Garden Court Chambers
Zrinka Bralo, CEO of Migrants Organise

chairs: Don Flynn and Giorgia Dona