I AM struck by the comments of Theresa May that her Brexit plan will stop EU migrants “jumping the queue” when it comes to working in the UK.
How low the UK has sunk that its Brexiteer government is now resorting to spreading resentment towards European citizens, classing them as “queue jumpers”? These individuals took no part in this mess and work here legally and contribute to the country in so many different ways.
They have the same general right of freedom of movement that allows British people the opportunity to work in Berlin and Paris, or retire in Spain.
Even so, their reward seems to be an increasingly hostile atmosphere. Ms May makes no mention of those British “queue jumpers” in other EU countries, symptomatic no doubt of the same attitude that classes those Brits abroad as “expats”, while those from the other EU countries who come to work here are “immigrants”, an increasingly negative term.
Since the referendum in 2016 there has been an alarming increase in both veiled and more explicit verbal abuse to EU nationals, and this will no doubt increase as the negative impacts of Brexit become clearer and scapegoats will be required. Step forward those innocent EU nationals in our midst.
The UK has taken a wrong turn, as exhibited by the dog-whistle politics of Theresa May and her Tory government.
As the UK enters full panic mode, the victim of a bitter and corrupted Etonian gamble gone very wrong, we must do all that we can to support those EU nationals in our midst and defy this vile populist rhetoric.
Alex Orr
Edinburgh
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