A number of extremely clever lawyers have been puzzling over why the new immigration bill seems to criminalise organisations like the RNLI who might rescue asylum seekers at sea, when the Home Office claims it doesn't want to do that. There's a simple but awful explanation. 🧵

https://twitter.com/GeorgePeretzQC/status/1413848628247027715

Since last year Priti Patel's been crowing about 'people smugglers' she takes credit for jailing. But many of them were actually refugees trying to cross the Channel who at some point in the journey took control of the boat and were filmed by drone. independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-n…

Despite the clear legal position - EU citizens who miss the deadline are liable to criminal prosecution if they continue to work, and will lose their right to rent property, access the NHS etc. - the Government is refusing to come out and say it. theguardian.com/politics/2021/… I don't know if it's because they don't want the bad press. Or they have their head in the sand and hope it can be smoothed over. Or they just don't understand how the Hostile Environment works.

But it's grossly irresponsible. People's jobs and futures are at stake.

To give you a sense of how hard the Home Office tries to confuse people as to the law let's look at one tiny bit of hundreds of pages of new rules.

Let's start with the relevant bit of the Explanatory Memorandum. Simple yes? Nice of them to so clearly state in their explanatory notes attached to the rules what each bit of the rules does.

Part 9 sets out the powers to refuse or cancel visas based on 'suitability'. It does not apply to the Appendix FM route.

So @BBCMarkEaston thinks that after the Rivers of Blood speech in 1968 immigration was 'barely discussed' over three decades.

@JCWI_UK was founded in 1967, so let's have a look through the archives and see what we weren't doing during that 30 years, because it wasn't an issue. In 1969 (after as Mark says UK politicians were being accused of 'playing the race card'), those politicians make it harder for brown British citizens and their dependants to enter the UK. We have to go abroad to make people aware of their plight.

The most recent @IndependentCI report indicates @theresa_may @AmberRuddHR @sajidjavid responsible for a Home Office that ignores perpetrators of modern slavery, while pursuing the victims' for immigration offences. Slavery is basically less important than immigration numbers /1 From a review of just 48 case records the inspectors found several cases where there was evidence of exploitation, paying people less than minimum wage, modern slavery. Not one of them was followed up with the 'employer'. /2

Ok. Too infuriated to leave it here. Let's talk about how @sajidjavid and his rotten department are about to ruin Rory, Anna, and their daughters' lives, because the Home Office doesn't understand its own laws, and even though it agrees they're all allowed to enter the UK. /1

https://twitter.com/chaipatel0/status/1090755592560537600

Rory and his two young daughters are British. Anna is Russian, but as the spouse of an EEA national living in Ireland she has a right to enter the UK and live here for three months, before getting a UK id, which she is also entitled to upon application /2