This week’s Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) proves that racist and imperial ideals still run Britain on both sides of parliament. Labour Party prime minister Keir Starmer and Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch jostled for the position of who’s the most anti-Palestinian, upholding a double standard when it comes to refugee status, based on ethnicity.
Racist double standards at PMQs
Badenoch opened their exchange:
Mr Speaker, the Conservative government established the Ukraine family scheme. And in total, over 200,000 Ukrainians, mostly women, children and the elderly have found sanctuary in the UK from Putin’s war. However, a family of six from Gaza have applied to live in Britain using this scheme. And a judge has now ruled in their favour. This is not what the scheme was designed to do. This decision is completely wrong. It cannot be allowed to stand. Is the government planning to appeal on any points of law? And if so which ones?
In response, Starmer failed to point out that Badenoch is boldly championing a racist double standard. Apparently white Ukrainians facing Vladimir Putin’s war are worth more than Arab Palestinians facing Benjamin Netanyahu’s indiscriminate onslaught.
The Labour leader said at PMQs:
Mr Speaker let me be clear I do not agree with the decision, she’s right – it’s the wrong decision. She hasn’t quite done her homework because the decision… was taken under the last government, according to the legal framework of the last government. But Mr Speaker let me clear it should be parliament that makes the rules on immigration. It should be the government that makes the policy. That’s the principle. And the home secretary is already looking at the legal loophole that we need to close
So the issue for Starmer is which party is responsible for treating Ukrainians and Palestinians more equally in this case. As usual for Starmer, he has pledged the opposite to his actions – he vowed a “zero-tolerance approach to… racism” in 2023.
The Palestinian family of six includes a mother, a father, and four children aged seven, eight, 17 and 18. Israel destroyed their home in an airstrike. And the father’s brother is actually a British citizen.
Vicious
At PMQs, Badenoch continued her vicious approach:
Mr Speaker he did not answer the question. If he plans to appeal, then the appeal may be unsuccessful and the law will need to be changed… we cannot be in a situation where we allow enormous numbers of people to exploit our laws in this way. There are millions of people all around the world in terrible situations, we cannot help them all and we certainly cannot bring them all here.
But apparently we can help over 200,000 of them if they are white. The 1951 UN convention on refugees states its an international obligation to provide asylum for refugees.
Badenoch herself wasn’t a refugee when her mother traveled to the UK to give birth to her, specifically to secure a British passport, then went back to Nigeria to raise her. The Conservative leader now wants to pull up the drawbridge behind her.
At PMQs and more broadly, both party leaders are out of step with the public on refugees. 84% of Britons agree with the statement that “people should be able to take refuge in other countries, to escape from war or persecution”.
The UK should work with other countries to establish fair quotas for refugees, while stopping exporting the weapons that fuel the destruction.
Featured image via House of Commons
