UN tells UK government to stop forcing NHS and landlords to enforce 'hostile environment'

'It is no surprise that a policy that ostensibly seeks to target only irregular immigrants is destroying the lives and livelihoods of racial and ethnic minority communities'

The British government must stop forcing doctors, banks and landlords to enforce “hostile environment” immigration laws, a United Nations expert has said.

E Tendayi Achiume said policies supposedly directed at illegal migrants were “destroying the lives” of wider foreign and ethnic minority communities.

At the end of a two-week visit to the UK, the UN special rapporteur on racism, concluded that laws enacted under the coalition and Conservative governments that “deputise immigration enforcement to private citizens and civil servants in a range of arenas” must be repealed.

“In a national context that is deeply polarised, it is no surprise that a policy that ostensibly seeks to target only irregular immigrants is destroying the lives and livelihoods of racial and ethnic minority communities more broadly, including many that have been instrumental to the prosperity of this nation for decades, and are rightful claimants of citizenship status,” Ms Achiume said.

Speaking in London, she cited austerity, immigration laws and counter-terrorism policies among the structural dynamics undermining racial equality in Britain.

She heavily criticised the Right to Rent programme, which requires landlords to conduct visa inspections, bank checks and NHS data transfers that were partly scrapped earlier this week.

The policies had “effectively transformed places like hospitals, banks, and private residences into border checkpoints”, she said.

Ms Achiume warned that although nations are responsible for immigration enforcement, “over broad” laws that result in discrimination against racial and ethnic groups violates international human rights law.

In the wake of a scandal over the treatment of workers who were invited to Britain during the Windrush period and their children, the government has apologised for “appalling” cases and vowed not to deport anyone wrongfully.

Sajid Javid, who became home secretary following Amber Rudd’s resignation, has distanced himself from the “hostile environment” and said only illegal migrants will be targeted.

The government had already rebranded Theresa May’s flagship policy as the “compliant” environment, but Ms Achiume said nothing would change as long as parts of the 2014 and 2016 Immigration Acts that underpin it remain in place.

“Efforts such as eliminating deportation targets can achieve only slight cosmetic changes to an immigration enforcement regime that has permeated almost all aspects of social life in the UK,” she added.

“A hostile environment ostensibly created for and formally restricted to irregular immigrants is in effect a hostile environment for all racial and ethnic communities ... both unconscious bias and conscious racial prejudice remain alive and well.”

The special rapporteur’s final report, to be presented to the UN Human Rights Council in June 2019, will focus on the impact of Brexit on racial equality in the UK.

Releasing her preliminary findings, Ms Achiume highlighted huge increases in reported racial and religious hate crimes around the EU referendum.

She warned of a “growth in the acceptability of explicit racial, ethnic and religious intolerance” and called on the government to adopt policies shielding migrants from the threat of discrimination after Brexit.

But her report said systematic bias long predated the June 2016 vote and has a range of causes.

“The structural socioeconomic exclusion of racial and ethnic minority communities in the United Kingdom is striking,” Ms Achiume added.

“The harsh reality is that race, ethnicity, religion, gender, disability status and related categories all continue to determine the life chances and wellbeing of people in Britain in ways that are unacceptable and in many cases unlawful. Austerity measures have been disproportionately detrimental to racial and ethnic minority communities ... making women of colour the worst affected.”

She called on the government to subject all proposed fiscal policies to equality impact assessments that could flag any racial imbalances before they are brought in.

Weeks after a UN panel raised serious concern over the deaths of a “disproportionate number” of black and minority ethnic people in police custody, Ms Achiume hit out at inequality in the criminal justice system.

“I am shocked by the criminalisation of young people from ethnic minorities, especially young black men,” she said, citing racial imbalance in the use of stop and search, controversial gang matrix databases, joint enterprise laws and imprisonment.

“There can be no question that a pervasive and officially tolerated culture of racial profiling is at work in certain police forces," she added.

Ms Achiume said “national panic” over terrorism was driving Islamophobia and called for the government’s Prevent counter-extremism programme to be suspended and reviewed.

She concluded that the strategy was “fuelling distrust” between Muslim communities and public institutions required to report suspected radicalisation, while there is no evidence it works.

The rapporteur argued that Prevent’s forces “civil servants, social workers, care-givers, educators and others, to make life-altering judgments on the basis of vague criteria in a climate of national anxieties that scapegoat entire religious, racial and ethnic groups”.

Ms Achiume concluded that although the UK had shown leadership in some areas of racial equality, including the prime minister’s race disparity audit, the government still has “much to do”.

“I hope that this is only the first step towards transforming formal government commitments into reality, especially for those who experience the highest levels of exclusion, subordination and discrimination on the basis of their race or ethnicity,” she said.

Her recommendations have been presented to the government but the UN has no power to enforce them.

A government spokesperson said: “We note that the Special Rapporteur commended UK legislation and policy to tackle direct and indirect racial discrimination, and that in her end of mission statement she welcomed the Race Disparity Audit as ‘a remarkable step towards transforming formal commitments to racial equality into reality’.

"We have made great progress, but the Prime Minister is clear that if there is no rational explanation for ethnic disparities, then we – as a society – must take action to change them. That is precisely what we will do.”