Based on Chris Philp, MP for Croydon South and aspiring to be the nation’s Dwelling Secretary, “48 per cent of London’s social housing is occupied by people who find themselves international”.
Let’s undergo the methods during which that assertion is wrong, inflammatory and an perception into how far the Conservative Get together has fallen.
Philp’s definition of a foreigner and the that means he ascribes to information gathered through the 2021 Census are, whether or not by chance or by design, deceptive and feed an unpleasant and unfaithful far-Proper story about London specifically and immigrants generally.
In making his remarks on X final week, Philp gave recent momentum to that story, though it has been being convincingly challenged since at the very least the again finish of 2023 after it started circulating.
There are two huge issues with what Philp claimed:
The 48 per cent determine isn’t, in truth, a measure of the proportion of these residing in London social housing who have been born abroad.
Even when it was, lots of these the 48 per cent determine does discuss with, who have been certainly born abroad, are British residents.
The Census information Philp relied on isn’t in regards to the whole variety of London social housing occupants in any respect. Reasonably, it information the “family reference particular person” of such dwellings.
In UK statistics, the time period family reference particular person (HRP) is an up to date model of the older idea of the “head of the family”. It means one particular person inside a family, the one in whose identify the lodging is owned or rented or is in any other case answerable for it.
So though the Census information says that 376,754 HRPs in London social housing out of the 790,959 recorded have been born outdoors the UK – 48 per cent of them – it doesn’t comply with that 48 per cent of all London social housing occupants have been born outdoors the UK.
Dealing first with these 376,754 HRPs, is Philp proper to name all of them “international”? Many individuals who migrate to the UK from one other nation later attain British citizenship and obtain a certificates to show it, together with a welcome pack.
Having British citizenship is a sort of British nationality. A migrant who turns into a British nationwide is, like all different British nationals, entitled to use for the British passport, and can in all probability get one.
Taking a look at Londoners as an entire – all 9 million or so of us, no matter housing tenure – the 2021 Census discovered that 41 per cent of us have been born abroad, however solely 23 per cent had a non-UK passport.
Some British residents don’t have a UK passport and may need one for an additional nation – Eire, for instance – that means they’ve twin citizenship. It’s a bit sophisticated. However until the London HRPs born abroad have been attaining British citizenship (principally by way of “naturalisation”) at a far slower charge than different Londoners born abroad, an enormous chunk of that 48 per cent will now not be thought-about international nationals by the Dwelling Workplace. Many is not going to have been so for many years. But Philp, who can be Dwelling Secretary if the Conservatives have been in authorities, thinks it’s OK to go on calling that class of his fellow Britons “international”.
After we take into account the opposite occupants of London social housing whose Census HRP was born abroad, the 48 per cent determine seems even dodgier. Lots of them might be that particular person’s kids and even grandchildren and there’s a great likelihood that they’ve been British since delivery and if not develop into to later.
Because of PA media’s evaluation of December 2023 we all know that different Census information exhibits that in 2021 greater than 1.3 million UK-born individuals have been residing in social housing in London in comparison with about 525,000 who have been born abroad. That’s about 29 per cent.
And when you then strip out these born abroad who’ve develop into British residents, the determine for non-UK passport holding Londoners talked about above suggests about half of them could be British residents too. Others have appeared into this and located it to be lower than 15 per cent – that’s rather a lot lower than 48 per cent.
Why did Philp suppose it a good suggestion to revive this, to place it mildly, questionable and discredited narrative? The reply seems apparent: it’s a part of his occasion’s technique to fish for voter help in the identical pool of anti-immigrant sentiment as Reform UK, which is at present forward of the Tories in opinion polls.
That’s what informs Philp’s slack and emotive use of the phrase “international”. Certainly, the map that kinds a part of of his X submit was compiled by an ardent Reform supporter from the Rupert Lowe wing of that occasion who makes use of the identical definition.
It’s a formulation that legitimises the mistaken perception that migrants are the reason for London’s – and Britain’s – social housing shortages; the concept that if immigration was stopped there would out of the blue be a lot to go spherical.
Philp additionally makes the bald assertion that these “international” London social housing occupants “have doubtless paid little or no tax”, offering no proof to again it up. In abstract, his message is: “They’re coming over right here, residing on advantages and taking all our housing.”
There may be additionally a tradition struggle assault line embedded there, a canine whistle about who’s and who isn’t actually British that was heard loud and clear by an out-and-out racist who responded favourably to Philp’s submit.
Does Philp apply his definition of “international” to all British residents who have been born abroad? To Mo Farah, for instance? To his erstwhile parliamentary colleague Nadhim Zahawi? Or does he reserve his pejorative deployment of the phrase for these most probably to draw resentment from the kinds of individuals the Tories wish to woo again from Reform?
Does he know or care that the figures he has used are unsuitable and have been proven to be unsuitable many occasions, or has he taken inspiration from Donald Trump, who when caught in a lie responds by repeating the lie till, within the minds of these he is ready to dupe, it turns into another reality?
Does he care or perceive that the excellence he inherently makes between Britons who have been born in Britain and those that weren’t implies that, no matter immigration regulation says, the latter group shouldn’t take pleasure in the identical entitlements as the previous? {That a} two-tier strategy to British nationality ought to apply, with anybody not born right here perpetually handled in a different way?
The truth that such questions even should be requested exhibits how far to the Proper the Conservatives have travelled and the way low they’re ready to go. And it makes you surprise what depths they may sink to subsequent.
Footnote: Philp has a historical past of constructing false claims and failing to appropriate them.
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