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<h1 class="gmail-content__headline">Sajid Javid backs plans for stricter citizenship rules after Brexit
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Sajid Javid backs plans for stricter citizenship rules after Brexit
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<p>At Tory party conference, home secretary announces immigration overhaul <br></p>
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<p class="gmail-byline"><span>
<a rel="author" class="gmail-tone-colour" href="https://www.theguardian.com/profile/jamie-grierson"><span>Jamie Grierson</span></a></span> and <span>
<a rel="author" class="gmail-tone-colour" href="https://www.theguardian.com/profile/peterwalker"><span>Peter Walker</span></a></span></p>
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Tue 2 Oct 2018 <span class="gmail-content__dateline-time">16.42 EDT</span>
First published on Tue 2 Oct 2018 <span class="gmail-content__dateline-time">07.52 EDT</span>
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3:45
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</span> Sajid Javid interviewed by Guardian editor-in-chief Katharine Viner – video
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<p>The government has announced stricter immigration and citizenship rules to come into place after Brexit, with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/sajid-javid" class="gmail-u-underline">Sajid Javid</a>
later telling the Guardian’s editor-in-chief Katharine Viner that he
was unworried by the suggestion such rules would have prevented his own
father entering the UK.</p>
<p>The home secretary used his speech to the Conservative party
conference to say people seeking British citizenship would face tougher
English-language requirements, part of an immigration overhaul that will
include the end of free movement from the EU.</p>
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<p>In a broad speech set to intensify speculation about his leadership
ambitions, Javid unveiled plans for a beefed-up “British values test” to
replace the Life in the UK test for those looking to settle in the
country.</p>
<p>Overnight, he and Theresa May had <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/02/eu-citizens-lose-priority-under-post-brexit-immigration-plans" class="gmail-u-underline">announced proposals for a </a><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/02/eu-citizens-lose-priority-under-post-brexit-immigration-plans" class="gmail-u-underline">single immigration system</a>
that treats people from EU countries the same as those from non-EU
countries. Highly skilled workers who want to live and work in Britain
would be given priority, while low-skilled immigration would be curbed.</p>
<div id="gmail-dfp-ad--inline1" class="gmail-js-ad-slot gmail-ad-slot gmail-ad-slot--inline gmail-ad-slot--inline1 gmail-ad-slot--rendered"><div class="gmail-ad-slot__label">Advertisement</div><div id="gmail-google_ads_iframe_/59666047/theguardian.com/uk-news/article/ng_1__container__" style="border:0pt none" class="gmail-ad-slot__content"><div class="gmail-unruly_in_article_placement" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;line-height:normal;text-align:left;letter-spacing:initial;min-width:initial;min-height:initial;box-sizing:initial;font-size:initial;display:block;overflow:hidden;max-height:1px;opacity:1"><div class="gmail-unruly_ia_furniture" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;line-height:normal;text-align:left;letter-spacing:initial;min-width:initial;min-height:initial;box-sizing:initial;font-size:initial;display:block;height:22px"><img class="gmail-unruly_ia_closebutton" style="margin: 2px 2px 1px 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px none; line-height: normal; text-align: left; letter-spacing: initial; min-width: 0px; min-height: initial; box-sizing: initial; font-size: initial; height: 18px; width: 18px; float: right; opacity: 0.25; transition: all 0.25s cubic-bezier(0.445, 0.05, 0.55, 0.95) 0s; outline: transparent solid 1px; cursor: pointer;" src="https://video.unrulymedia.com/native/images/in-art-close-icon-128x128-16481b937f87b244a645cdbef0d930f8.png"><div class="gmail-unruly_ia_disclosure" style="margin:0px 18px;padding:2px 0px 0px;border:0px none;line-height:normal;text-align:left;letter-spacing:initial;min-width:initial;min-height:initial;box-sizing:initial;font-size:initial;display:block;opacity:0.5"><div class="gmail-unruly_ia_disclosure_text" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;line-height:21px;text-align:center;letter-spacing:initial;min-width:initial;min-height:initial;box-sizing:initial;font-size:10px;display:block;font-family:sans-serif">–– ADVERTISEMENT ––</div></div></div><div class="gmail-unruly_ia_bottombar" style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px none;line-height:normal;text-align:left;letter-spacing:initial;min-width:initial;min-height:initial;box-sizing:initial;font-size:initial;display:block;height:20px"><img class="gmail-unruly_ia_volume" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px none; line-height: normal; text-align: left; letter-spacing: initial; min-width: initial; min-height: initial; box-sizing: initial; font-size: initial; z-index: 100; width: 20px; height: 20px; cursor: pointer; opacity: 0.25; float: right; transition: all 0.25s cubic-bezier(0.445, 0.05, 0.55, 0.95) 0s; background: black none repeat scroll 0% 0%; border-radius: 50%; display: inline-block;" src="https://video.unrulymedia.com/native/images/unmiss-sound-button-muted-e74d67a0c85c3548f07d7564782a269c.svg"></div></div></div></div><p>Speaking
later in an interview on the conference fringe with Viner, the home
secretary said he was not concerned by the thought that under such a
regime his father, who arrived from Pakistan in 1961 with £1 and no
skills, would be barred from entry.</p>
<p>When his father came, Javid said, the entry system was very different
as the governments of the time “wanted, needed, a route for low-skilled
migration”.</p>
<p>Asked if it made him sad this would no longer be the case, he said:
“No, it doesn’t make me feel sad. Actually, with today’s policy it makes
me very optimistic about our future. Because what I have also set out
is that we will remain the global-outlook nation that welcomes people
from across the world, no matter where they’re from.”</p>
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<p>In his speech, Javid announced plans aimed at improving
integration and described the current Life in the UK test as a “pub
quiz”.</p>
<p>“It’s about integration, not segregation,” he said. “And I’m
determined to break down barriers to integration wherever I find them.
Take, for example, the most basic barrier of all: language.”</p>
<p>Javid said 700,000 people living in the UK could not speak English.</p>
<p>“As home secretary, I will apply these principles to those who arrive
in our country. So not only will there be a new values test but we will
also strengthen the English-language requirements for all new
citizens.”</p>
<p>Highly skilled migrants coming to the UK on a work visa will not face
tougher language requirements than those already in place, the Guardian
understands.</p>
<p>Javid said earlier he would consider scrapping the cap on the number
of highly skilled migrants as part of the post-Brexit plan. The limit is
currently 20,000.</p>
<p>Applicants will need to meet a minimum salary threshold – for highly
skilled migrants this currently stands at £30,000 – but Javid has hinted
that this will be reviewed.</p>
<p>In his speech in the main hall, the home secretary said: “Thanks to
the [Brexit] referendum we now have a unique opportunity to reshape our
immigration system for the future.</p>
<p>“A skills-based, single system that is opened up to talent from
across the world. A system that doesn’t discriminate between any one
region or country. A system based on merit. That judges people not by
where they are from, but on what they can do.</p>
<p>“What people want – and they will get – is control of our own system.
With a lower, and sustainable level of net migration. And, above all,
that has to mean one thing: an end to freedom of movement.”</p>
<p>The government has said it intends to publish a white paper this
autumn and a bill the following year, meaning it is highly unlikely MPs
will get to vote on the legislation before the UK leaves the EU in
March.</p>
<p>In the interview with Viner, Javid, who has previously spoken about
how his mother did not learn to speak English until more than decade
after she arrived in the UK, talked about his anger at the unfair
targeting of people from the Windrush generation by immigration
enforcement.</p>
<p>“The first thing that went through my mind is that it could have been
my parents,” he said. “Imagine if this was my mum or my uncle, someone
who had lived in Britain their whole life, contributed so much, being
detained or, worse, removed from the country.”</p>
<p>But Javid vehemently rejected that the post-2010 Conservative
government had been primarily responsible for the Windrush crisis with
the so-called hostile environment policy, saying a lot of it had begun
under Labour.</p>
<p>“If people portray this as a problem that happened under a Tory
government, it’s incorrect. It’s either bad reporting or a deliberate
attempt to twist the fact,” he said.</p>
<p>Javid, who again spoke about a range of subjects well beyond his
official brief, was similarly blunt about Labour’s interventionist
economic policies, saying: “The trouble is, Jeremy Corbyn really
believes what he says. And he’s completely deluded.”</p>
<p>Elsewhere in his speech, he announced a package of new measures to
tackle forced marriage, including proposals to refuse spousal entry to
the UK where there is evidence a marriage is forced.</p>
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+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+<br><br> Harold F. Schiffman<br><br>Professor Emeritus of <br> Dravidian Linguistics and Culture <br>Dept. of South Asia Studies <br>University of Pennsylvania<br>Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305<br><br>Phone: (215) 898-7475<br>Fax: (215) 573-2138 <br><br>Email: <a href="mailto:haroldfs@gmail.com" target="_blank">haroldfs@gmail.com</a><br><a href="http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/" target="_blank">http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/</a> <br><br>-------------------------------------------------</div></div>