The Rewards of Loyalty: Deportation

The redoubtable Bob Russell (Colchester) yesterday continued, along with his Party Leader Nick Clegg, to apply pressure on the Government over their shameful treatment of the Gurkhas. The MOD finally backed down last year over equal pension rights after a protracted legal battle. But another High Court battle is beginning over retired Gurkha soldiers' right to remain in UK as they have just been granted a Judicial Review.

Any Gurkha who joined the British army post-1997 and has served four years will be granted British citizenship and it would be reasonable to assume that was well deserved after sorties in Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq. For those who joined before that arbitrary debate, there is no similar dispensation. The 2,000 or so mainly retired soldiers face deportation to Nepal. When they marched on Parliament just before Easter, Gordon Brown even refused a meeting with representatives (who is advising the man?) Even the image of these war heroes handing back their medals by the dozen apparently leaves Ministers unmoved.

These extra-ordinary stern, if not pernicious immigration rules are far from the exception. Gord last week tried to appear magnanimous by announcing a moratorium on returning failed asylum seekers back to Zimbabwe. Leaving the substantial moral issues to one side, deportations would be practically rather difficult as Gord has proposed sanctions to cease all Zimbabwean Airways flights in the EU and no British airline flies to Harare anymore.

These 11,000 Zimbabweans, now in limbo, are not entitled to benefits nor are they legally allowed to work. There is no advice from the Home Office on how they should stay alive in the meantime but clearly working illegally is their only option. Britain has a long (and once proud) tradition of accepting oppressed and terrorised groups from the European Jews of the 1930s to the Ugandan Asians in the 1970s. Their acceptance was combined with an expectation they would "stand on their own two feet." Immigration policy now outlaws that. And in the case of the Gurkhas long service to the country is rewarded with a couple of ribbons and a kick up the arse out of the country.