Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Sheilbh]

I'm not sure what you want the press to do here. I don't quite get how you think the media should behave. What should they report and how? To my eyes it is clearly news, in the public interest to report and actually quite important.

We're a year after riots (and counter protests) targeting asylum seekers and hotels. At the start of the summer (May or so), the Cabinet Office and Angela Rayner briefed the cabinet that there was a risk of social breakdown over protests at asylum hotels this summer. And with evidence the Guardian found of small but extreme far right groups trying to orchestrate them (incidentally in response to this, Farage and Reform HQ have explicitly banned party members from organising events on WhatsApp or social media precisely for fear of the far right infiltrating).

The numbers aren't high but there's over 30 protests across the country. And at the start of the summer there was interesting reporting on this from Epping and Nuneaton that kicked it off (and had local news inciting incidents). Also an interesting thing I read from a left-wing counter-protester in Islington a little bit on the protests (not, so far as they could see, infiltrated by the far right - but overwhelmingly made up of local women - again following a specific incident) but also working with the Stand Up To Racism lot (an SWP front so challenging).

And FWIW I agree with Rayner and the Cabinet Office. I think on this but also a number of issues (the low level crime and the bond markets/economy) I think at this point it's a matter of when and not if there is a crisis that really kicks off.

[Josquius]

I guess they could report with that in mind.

"potentially related to this story we uncovered in May fascist agitators have begun their protests. We have found the gathering of 11 men, 2 women, and one staffie, outside the hotel in Epping was organised by Harry Keeth, Nick Griffins former hairdresser and long standing figure in far right circles.
With a smug grin one of the women, Susan O'Neil, said 'we is not racist! We just worried about our kids! Can't be having foreigners coming over here with their horrid religion, definitely just after our women!' however whilst she was saying this our reporter overheard two of the men laughing about going to the toilet on a Koran"

As it is they're reporting it as if it's a huge national event and just saying straight that these normal citizens with valid concerns are worried about their children and are not affiliated with fascist circles at all.
They're feeding the disorder they predicted.

[Sheilbh]

But that's not what happened. It started in Epping after someone housed in the asylum hotel was charged with sexually assaulting a 14 year old girl walking home from school. There was a similar incident involving rape and abduction of a 12 year old girl in Nuneaton which started the protests there. Something similar in Islington. Those are the three protests I've read about.

Those incidents weren't national stories but on the local news. The protests started local and in all cases were pretty much mainly women to begin with. Reading about Nuneaton it was interesting as basically white British and British Asian local residents basically agreed they didn't want the asylum HMOs in their area, felt powerless about them being imposed by the state and were angry about the crime. They also didn't want "outsiders" coming to join the protests, because they expected they'd make it "far-right" and "racist" and cause problems locally.

That's exactly what's happening, as in that Guardian report. But it's opportunism by the far-right, not made of whole cloth by them.

I'd add reading about dealing with SUTR there's almost the exact same dynamic in the counter-protests. That was in Islington and everyone involved agreed they wanted the counter-protests to be local, they wanted to leaflet the area for turn out and these are still mostly local protests without far-right infiltration and they wanted to respond in that way. The SUTR turn up, start describing it as an SUTR protest, flood it with activists from all over London and the South-East, do a phenomenal job of leafleting 10,000 people but not in the local area and they're running all the old slogans they've been shouting since the 70s.

[Tamas]

But that's not what happened. It started in Epping after someone housed in the asylum hotel was charged with sexually assaulting a 14 year old girl walking home from school. There was a similar incident involving rape and abduction of a 12 year old girl in Nuneaton which started the protests there. Something similar in Islington. Those are the three protests I've read about.

Those incidents weren't national stories but on the local news. The protests started local and in all cases were pretty much mainly women to begin with. Reading about Nuneaton it was interesting as basically white British and British Asian local residents basically agreed they didn't want the asylum HMOs in their area, felt powerless about them being imposed by the state and were angry about the crime. They also didn't want "outsiders" coming to join the protests, because they expected they'd make it "far-right" and "racist" and cause problems locally.

That's exactly what's happening, as in that Guardian report. But it's opportunism by the far-right, not made of whole cloth by them.

I'd add reading about dealing with SUTR there's almost the exact same dynamic in the counter-protests. That was in Islington and everyone involved agreed they wanted the counter-protests to be local, they wanted to leaflet the area for turn out and these are still mostly local protests without far-right infiltration and they wanted to respond in that way. The SUTR turn up, start describing it as an SUTR protest, flood it with activists from all over London and the South-East, do a phenomenal job of leafleting 10,000 people but not in the local area and they're running all the old slogans they've been shouting since the 70s.

So what's the lesson? That it is ok to have local protests against asylum seekers if one of them is a rapist (implying not even subtly that all of them are)? Because, frankly, if we are ok with two independent locales reaching the  local asylum seekers = dangerous rapists conclusion and have them organise against those local asylum seekrs, then we have no right to say that it is not ok to draw the next logical conclusion that then all asylum seekers must be rapists, followed by the nexter logical conclusion: to organise nationally against them.

[garbon]

I'm not sure what you want the press to do here. I don't quite get how you think the media should behave. What should they report and how? To my eyes it is clearly news, in the public interest to report and actually quite important.

I'd go back to basics and think about what is actually newsworthy. Ever random thing that Farage says is not that. Think about adding context to reporting. Also, stop using twitter as a key source.

[Josquius]

https://observer.co.uk/news/opinion-and-ideas/article/politically-acceptable-uk-racism-is-on-the-rise-and-worse-this-is-under-progressive-labour-rule

As I wrote these words last autumn: "We have made progress... even though that progress remains fragile and insufficient", little did I realise just how right I was.

Consider what's going on. The often openly racist protests outside hotels housing migrants, with some supposed community organisations apparently heavily influenced by white nationalist groups. The increasingly frequent elision of the terms "non-UK born" and "non-British". The implication in some accounts that "white British" is somehow superior to other forms of Britishness. The angry calls for mass deportations – not just of irregular migrants but of people settled here legally


Robert Jenrick, widely seen as a future Conservative leader, has made something of a hobby of bemoaning the decline of "white British" in some towns. As notable is the apparent radicalisation of hitherto moderate Conservatives like Neil O'Brien, with his warnings of "utter oblivion".

Nor is the government immune. Keir Starmer has echoed the language of Jenrick (himself reprising Enoch Powell), arguing that we risk becoming an "island of strangers" while attacking the "open borders" policies of his predecessors. The prime minister's X feed now represents a bizarre mixture of liberal internationalism (on Ukraine) and rightwing talking points (on immigration).

All of a sudden, the Overton window – the range of issues it is politically acceptable to discuss – seems to be widening in an alarming manner. The deliberately incendiary juxtaposition of "Muslim" and "migrant" with "rapist" or "illegal" has become almost the norm in some parts of public debate.
Now, a�dmittedly, there are two sides to this story. While people like Konstantin Kisin are happy to argue that brown, Hindu Rishi Sunak can't be English, and while the now oh-so-predictable horde of X trolls were willing to abuse the former prime minister for celebrating Yorkshire Day, they are not representative of the country as a whole. Nine out of 10 people in England agree that those born in England who identify as English should be accepted as English.

It is not obvious what electoral benefit the government expects to gain from its current stance. And to be clear, this is nothing to do with the debate about immigration numbers

So it's important to keep things in perspective. Yet difficult too. I recently went to a family wedding in North Yorkshire. Some 300 guests, a large proportion of them Indian, descended on a town that was, according to 2021 census data, 97.1% white. And I felt things I'd not felt since my childhood. That hyper alertness if a group of us was walking round the town. That clocking of people looking at us, not least in the local inn, where many of us were staying. My nervousness about going out in Indian dress, my ears pricked for casual comments.

As it turned out, I had no need to worry. The people of Northallerton were wonderful hosts. But I didn't enjoy the flashbacks. And while I was worrying over nothing, imagine how your average food delivery driver feels now that the government itself seems to be encouraging suspicion about their immigration status. Or those people living less privileged lives than me who find themselves the object of an overt racism that appears to be becoming acceptable again.

All of which is bad enough on its own terms. And worse in that it's happening under a supposedly "progressive" Labour government that seems strangely reluctant to stand up for ethnic minorities.

But what is even stranger is that the politics of it all make no sense. I can think of a number of people who will be delighted by the increased salience of immigration. None of them, however, should be Labour strategists. You don't fight Reform UK by making its strongest issue the national priority. Nor, as countless political-science research projects have illustrated, do you effectively combat the radical right by accommodating them.

And it's not as if Labour faces a challenge only from the right. Ipsos found in June this year that the party was losing more 2024 voters to the Greens and Lib Dems (5% and 8% respectively) than to Reform (12% of its 2024 vote). Meanwhile, a poll for the New Statesman published last Thursday found that one in three people who voted Labour in 2024 would consider voting for the new, as yet nameless, party set up by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana. As Professor Rob Ford reminded us before last year's election, this was in fact the first government elected on the back of a pro-immigration electoral coalition.

It is not obvious, therefore, what electoral benefit the government expects to gain from its current stance. And to be clear, this is nothing to do with the debate about immigration numbers. It would be perfectly consistent to aim to reduce those numbers while speaking out against the pernicious racism that seems to be affecting public debate once more. Indeed, given that integration is a crucial element of any successful immigration policy, pushing back – as Tony Blair once did – against those who seek to sow division would make practical sense.

I was feeling pretty relaxed about racism when I wrote that original piece. Too relaxed, as it turns out. The status quo now feels far more fragile than it did then.

Anand Menon is director of The UK in a Changing Europe

Not directly on this... But the island of strangers bit.... I actually totally agree with that line... But in a way that has absolutely fuck all to do with immigration.

[Sheilbh]

So what's the lesson? That it is ok to have local protests against asylum seekers if one of them is a rapist (implying not even subtly that all of them are)? Because, frankly, if we are ok with two independent locales reaching the  local asylum seekers = dangerous rapists conclusion and have them organise against those local asylum seekrs, then we have no right to say that it is not ok to draw the next logical conclusion that then all asylum seekers must be rapists, followed by the nexter logical conclusion: to organise nationally against them.

Asylum hotels shouldn't exist and are a compounded policy failure. They're outsourced, privately run contingent/emergency accommodation for people awaiting an asylum claim because there's a huge backlog of claims waiting to be heard, the government policy is "disperal" across the country and we've run out of long-term accommodation. In addition the spaces in long-term accommodation that are available are prioritised for women and children (or, more rarely, families) claiming asylum who are, for safeguarding reasons, not housed with the single men. There were zero asylum hotels before covid.

I think it's fair for local communities to have real issues with contingent accommodation for a few hundred men who will basically come and go (it is contingent so no permanence) run by Serco - especially because since 2002 we have not allowed asylum seekers to work which means you've got young men with lots of time on their hands. To me it's like a halfway house or something similar (except really, really expensive because the UK uses hotels more than anywhere else in Europe) where I think communities will not want that there and you probably need to bribe them. But we don't. And then you have something like a crime and I think it's inevitable the opposition will increase.

I'd add that because of the goal to keep costs down, inevitably, the hotels and HMOs are broadly in the poorest areas of local authorities.

I think Cooper is right in her announcements on decisions being made more quickly, in making the right to appeal more difficult - because the underlying issue is the backlog and speed of processing. I'd also note this is exactly the stuff that was how Blair and Blunkett cracked down in 2002 when asylum was a similarly big issue (and the last time the numbers were this high).

I'd go back to basics and think about what is actually newsworthy. Ever random thing that Farage says is not that. Think about adding context to reporting. Also, stop using twitter as a key source.

Totally agree on the last point - and on adding context which I think the Guardian absolutely does.

On the newsworthy I think the press do that - I am aware that Farage is the popular politician in the UK on TikTok and posts weird videos. I've not really seen any coverage of that beyond noting it and Reform's social media strategy v other parties. But what the Guardian are quoting is a big interview he did with the Times trailing a big policy announcement (I think for this week) - that's absolutely standard in how papers report party leaders. Especially ones polling at 30-35%.

On Anand - very good piece and I totally agree. I've seen some polling somewhere (possibly Luke Tryl) and it is really interesting how much the "not British/English" stuff seems to be a view with young men more than other groups. It's the sort of thing I've not really heard of who is/isn't "really British" in a very long time but is coming back online. I think you probably saw that with two "edgy" YouTube interviewers arguing with a former editor of the Spectator that Rishi Sunak isn't English when he is spectacularly English. I also think you see it with the way people use Kemi Badenoch's full name ("Olukemi Olufunto Adegoke Badenoch") to very unsubtly imply she's not really British.

I slightly disagree on the Blair analogy. I think you can agree on trying to reduce immigration, have a border that is seen to be working, support integration and also reject racism - I think that is really important.

But I think it slightly misremembers just how controversial and problematic some of Blair's policy and statements were or were seen. Whether it was Jack Straw speaking about being uneasy dealing with women in a full veil, or the external processing proposals - David Blunkett proposed an EU wide scheme to house asylum seekers in Ukraine and Russia while their applications were processed, which didn't get anywhere, and then pursued a bilateral deal with Tanzania. He also proposed using barges, banning the children of asylum seekers from attending schools and using prison tags to monitor asylum seekers during processing of their claims (I don't think any of these passed). They also introduced the practice of detaining children in immigration centres (abolished and banned under the Coalition - and still not allowed). Labour talked about the country being "swamped" by non-English speaking migrants. They were very aggressive in their language on their need for migrants to "be more British". There were lots of complaints about "out of touch" judges and human rights law blocking the state from taking actions people wanted.

I think in many ways there is a fair bit more overlap and echo with New Labour's immigration policy (very relaxed on economic migration, cruel and very opposed to asylum) than the comparison with Blair acknowledges.

[Tamas]

The flag shaggers were busy in my town over the long weekend.

Gotta say though some spots do look better with flags on. 

Still think they must be handled with stoic calmness. Councils should remove them and non-racist people should refuse to give the gammons the fight they are looking for.

[Josquius]

I'm not climbing any ladders but if I encounter one at ground level I will 100% write SAFC on it.
So far I've just seen a few awful looking roundabouts- the white paint was already only 20% there and they seemed to use rubbish paint.

On Anand - very good piece and I totally agree. I've seen some polling somewhere (possibly Luke Tryl) and it is really interesting how much the "not British/English" stuff seems to be a view with young men more than other groups. It's the sort of thing I've not really heard of who is/isn't "really British" in a very long time but is coming back online. I think you probably saw that with two "edgy" YouTube interviewers arguing with a former editor of the Spectator that Rishi Sunak isn't English when he is spectacularly English. I also think you see it with the way people use Kemi Badenoch's full name ("Olukemi Olufunto Adegoke Badenoch") to very unsubtly imply she's not really British.

This one is curious as it blows from both ways.
If you're from Britain you're British and to say otherwise is racist bollocks is pretty established. I've not seen much questioning of this about.
English though....thats a lot more of a cursed word. Huge associations that this is some kind of blood line racist-identifier. Lots of people from England who don't identify as English (hi) .
There's the racist side weighing in there but also a lot from the opposite direction.
Overall I go with identify however you want and as long as its not an obvious piss take* then its fine.

*Chinese guy who has never left China and has zero relatives from the UK? No you're not a Scouser you tit.

Asylum hotels shouldn't exist and are a compounded policy failure. They're outsourced, privately run contingent/emergency accommodation for people awaiting an asylum claim because there's a huge backlog of claims waiting to be heard, the government policy is "disperal" across the country and we've run out of long-term accommodation. In addition the spaces in long-term accommodation that are available are prioritised for women and children (or, more rarely, families) claiming asylum who are, for safeguarding reasons, not housed with the single men. There were zero asylum hotels before covid.

I think it's fair for local communities to have real issues with contingent accommodation for a few hundred men who will basically come and go (it is contingent so no permanence) run by Serco - especially because since 2002 we have not allowed asylum seekers to work which means you've got young men with lots of time on their hands. To me it's like a halfway house or something similar (except really, really expensive because the UK uses hotels more than anywhere else in Europe) where I think communities will not want that there and you probably need to bribe them. But we don't. And then you have something like a crime and I think it's inevitable the opposition will increase.

In a world that is good sure that should be fine.
But in 2025 Britain with the far right on the march.... It pays to have a healthy suspicion of any criticisms that asylum hotels are bad (which yeah, they clearly are). The far right very commonly hide their shit behind reasonable takes.

I slightly disagree on the Blair analogy. I think you can agree on trying to reduce immigration, have a border that is seen to be working, support integration and also reject racism - I think that is really important.

The boats are an outcome of the border working.


In other news. Reform voters are truly batshit insane.



Though 2008 being so forgotten across the board.... Worrying.
I do wonder how it'd look if you could pick two.

[Josquius]

I've seen a few crappy roundabout St George's crosses lately. And maybe more flags on houses than usual? - one always really union flag decorated house has added the Ulster banner very prominently.
No lampost ones though.

Meanwhile in Wales...

https://newyddion.s4c.cymru/article/29979



Very patriotic.

Though as much as I disapprove of this stuff in general, I would dearly love to see their efforts at a dragon given they can't even manage a cross.

[Tamas]

Such a strong example of parallel realities. They probably got all worked up by GB News an whatever social media feeds they are on, upset that people are being harassed or even prosecuted for showing the national flag. Then literally everyone else in the country bar their inverse mirror images on the fringy Left just shrug at the whole thing.

[Legbiter]

So what is the mood in the UK right now? Is the North one incident away from going up in flames?

[Josquius]

Reform has to reselct their candidate for Croydon mayor.

What is it this time? Racism? Transphobia? Being a convicted sexual offender?

Nope.
She had been dead six months when they picked her....

https://insidecroydon.com/2025/08/27/farage-party-picked-a-dead-woman-to-run-for-croydon-mayor/

[Razgovory]

Hey, I voted for a dead guy once.  He won too!

[Valmy]

Hey, I voted for a dead guy once.  He won too!

I remember that