Going to do a quick thread on some of the historical/political context to Powell and his speech, given all the controversy about Saturday's show on BBC R4 1/?
2/? Powell was not always anti-immigration. As Health Minister in the early 1960s he led drive to recruit Commonwealth imms into the NHS. Which means some of "Windrush generation" currently in conflict with the Home Office may be children of migrants recruited by Enoch Powell
The specific context of Powell's speech is often forgotten. It was a reaction to not one but two Labour government initiatives in response to the Kenyan Asians crisis....which was in turn a very messy story from which Wilson's Labour govt does not come out well 4/?
5/? To understand the Kenyan Asians crisis, you have to understand the state of British citizenship law in the 1960s. Britain granted full citizenship rights to everyone in the Empire and Commonwealth in 1948 (Brit Nat Act 1948) - right to live, work, settle in GB & bring family.
6/? On top of this, Macmillan govt made specific pledges to Asian minorities in Africa that their rights to come to Britain would be respected when African colonies became independent (they worried, with it turns out good reason, that African majority govts wld persecute them).
7/? The Kenyan Asians crisis arose when large numbers of Kenyan Asians, facing hostility from Kenya's post independence govt, began to exercise these rights. There was a major public backlash to this, which spooked the Wilson Lab govt. Wilson and Home Sec Callaghan (later PM)...
8/? ...passed new legislation in 1968 which unilaterally revoked the Kenyan Asians' rights to come to Britain. The British govt, who had previously assured this group its rights would be protected, abandoned them overnight.
9/? As Kenyan govt had forced them to choose bet British & Kenyan citizenship, this left 200k or so people stateless, stranded in Kenya but without citizenship rights there, with British passports rendered worthless. This year is also 50th anniversary of this act. By a Lab govt.
10/? Many at the time recognised this for what it was - a capitulation to largely racially motivated public hostility (polls in this period show 80-90% of public opposed to what was referred to then as "coloured migration). Lab needed something to balance this...
11/?...so at same time as proposing the imm leg which shamefully abandoned Kenyan Asians, a group prev (Con) govt had pledged to protect, they also proposed the first race relations legislation passed in Britain, the 1968 - 50th anniversary of that this year also.
12/? Enoch Powell's speech was a reaction to both - he railed against both the citizenship rules which produced the crisis and against the race relations legislation Lab passed in response to it.
13/? So Powell was not an anti-imm demagogue reacting against a liberal Lab govt - he was an anti-imm and free speech fundamentalist reacting against a Lab govt that was *itself* abandoning imms but trying to cover its tracks with race relations legislation.
14/? The political impact of Powell's speech was immediate and dramatic. Polling showed overwhelming public agreement with his stance, and "best leader" polls suggested he was more popular than Con leader Ted Heath (who immediately sacked him from front bench)
15/? Powell had a major impact on the 1970 general election. Despite his sacking, a large section of the public believed Powell's rhetoric on repatriation and total halt to migration represented official Con policy, and voted accordingly...
16/? Several studies suggest anti-imm voters switching from Lab to Con helped Heath unexpectedly win the 1970 election. Pressure from Powell was also a factor leading to the more liberal Heath passing further restrictive imm legislation in 1971.
17/? There is a coda to this story tho. Another "African Asians" crisis arose under Heath's govt when Idi Amin gave tens of thousands of Ugandan Asians (again with British passports) weeks to leave. The reaction of Heath's Conservative govt was v diff to Wilson's in 1968...
18/? While Wilson, and Lab, abandoned the Kenyan Asians, Heath and the Cons accepted their obligations to Ugandan Asians, arguing Britain had a moral obligation to them. Enoch Powell, of course, was apopleptic about this.
19/? By 1974, due to Ugandan Asians crisis, Powell had spent several years railing *against* his own party for being too liberal on imm, even tho it had passed restrictive reforms. The anti-imm voters who took their lead from Powell ceased to see Cons as anti-imm pty.
Cons lost in 1974. Many factors to that, but Powell and imm may once again be one. One ambitious Con who watched and learned from all this was Mrs M Thatcher, who adopted a hard line on imm when leader in 1979 (tho she toned down the rhetoric).
21/? As the length of this string illustrates, this was a complex story, and much of that complexity has been lost in how it is remembered. Cons seen as villains of the piece on imm, due to Powell demagoguery. Shameful acts of Wilson, Callaghan & Lab largely forgotten.
22/? Heath's support for Ugandan Asians, one of the few genuinely liberal actions by a PM on immigration since WWII, is also mostly forgotten.
23/? There is also the irony of how imm & Powell affected elections. In 1970, voters elected a Con govt because they thought it was more anti-imm than it was (thanks to Powell). 4 yrs later they rejected a more anti-imm Con govt because (Powell again) they thought it was pro-imm.
24/? The 1971 leg passed by Cons following pressure from Powell is also the leg which granted Indefinite Leave to Remain to pre 1971 Commonwealth cits in Britain. The failure to properly document this group & their rights then is what is driving the "Windrush migrants" crisis
So the ghost of Powell hangs over us all in many ways - in popular (mis)understandings of the history of imm to Britain; in the presence of Commonwealth imms in Britain (Powell recruited them) & in the struggles that same group have today with the Home Office /ENDS/
(to clarify: not saying all Commonwealth imms here due to Powell, but some were recuited by him. And even in Rivers of Blood speech he defended migration of Commonwealth students and doctors to Britain)
(correction: first race relations legislation was 1965 (also Wilson govt). Apologies for the error.
V glad this thread is proving interesting and helpful to people. If you want to learn more, I strongly recommend Randall Hansen's book "Citizenship and Immigration in Postwar Britain" - IMO the best historical account of this period, capturing all the complexity and contradiction
