In an excellent analysis, Newmania reports that:
In a plan which is bound to be applauded by the BNP’s Nick Griffin, Labour intends to drop a plan to make families pay a cash bond for relatives who visit from India and Pakistan, instead there will be heavy fines or the threat of jail if family members overstay.Liam Byrne has just told the BBC’s Asian Network radio station that “what we want to do is have a new system but punish people if things go wrong.” He was referring to people coming over for family weddings and then disappearing. Byrne said the government now wanted to “make sure that we can just hit people and hit people hard if their family member breaks the rules”.
Sunny Hundal was absolutely right that “it’s time for Brown people to switch to Tory” if Labour are going to treat South Asian people this way and “hit people hard”. Liam Byrne is disgusting: Labour has already betrayed its core vote with the 10p tax and now they are going to go on the offensive against harmless (often elderly) South Asians going to weddings in the UK. Whatever next? I hope Byrne resigns for this.
Mountjoy