I guess I was lucky to survive my breakfast today. First of all, I almost choked on my Corn Flakes reading some of the tales on the “What’s your funniest canvassing experience?” post. Mark Smulian has a lot to answer for. And if your sides aren’t sore enough, Alex Wilcock has done a whole post recounting his tales from the doorstep. I might disagree with him on the worst by-election candidate ever, though.

Things got more serious, though. Hilarity turned to annoyance and shame when I saw Nigel Farage on BBC Breakfast going on about immigration. “Uncontrolled mass immigration” he kept saying. Now there’s a phrase redolent with demonising people, fear and stoking up resentment against people who come to this country to work. You know, those people without whom we wouldn’t have a National Health Service. Those people who make a significant net contribution to the wealth of this nation by paying their taxes. The way UKIP and Farage have both Cameron and Miliband dancing to their fraudulent tune is sickening and is not backed up by evidence. Just the other day, a study reported in the Independent showed that, contrary to the nonsense spread by UKIP, immigrants are not coming over here and taking our jobs.

Anyone who knows anything about the immigration system knows how difficult it is to get into this country. In fact, some people find it hard enough to even get their spouses, the people they are sharing their lives with, living here. Last month, Holly Matthies wrote as part of our Time to Talk day about the effect on her health of the struggle to get to live with her husband in the UK:

That first time I flew to the UK, my feckless answers to the questions I was asked — I’d just had to drop out of university due to poor mental health, so I was met with suspicion because they weren’t sure I had any reason to go back home — led to even more questions, and having to wait while the whole next planeful of new arrivals were processed, and then more questions. My partner, who was waiting to meet me, was found and asked questions to see if his answers matched mine. My checked luggage was fetched and searched. Eventually the border guards had to admit there was no reason to prevent me from entering the UK, but they seemed almost disappointed by that fact.

Think I sound paranoid? Well as the old saying goes, it’s only paranoia if they’re not actually out to get you. And as an immigrant I can be in no doubt that the country I worked so hard and sacrificed so much to move to is out to get me, more lately than ever. I watch with not just intellectual interest but visceral panic the conversations unfolding on social media and down the pub. I cringe when even the party I joined for being pro-immigration is proud of cutting interpreters for people taking their driving test and talks about “British workers” and “British families.” it feels like we non-British are only talked “about”, never “to”. Much less talked _with_.‎ What is an abstract debate to some is a matter of life and liberty to us.

Dentist Pramod Subbaraman, standing for the Liberal Democrats in Edinburgh South, had this to say on Facebook about his experience of coming to live in the UK:

I had to meet near impossible conditions for several years. I had to apply for 3 work permits and 3 tier 2 visas over 5 years before I could apply to settle. I was not allowed a day of unemployment during that period and had to live in fear of further new laws and a lot of uncertainty during all that time. All that stress has taken its toll on my health and well being. I am in many ways left traumatised by it all. I can’t rule out there being PTSD type experiences from time to time. Life for a Non European immigrant who is trying to follow the rules and do the right thing is HELL! Upto the point of settlement. After that, you’re only dealing with prejudice, which if you’ve survived to settlement, almost becomes the cost of doing business and gets factored in! Sad! Very sad! But true! 

Respect? Dignity? I never saw any of that

I hope that by standing for parliament, I can challenge the anti-immigration brigade. I hope to be the candidate who represents immigration and immigrants, having been through all that trauma myself. 

And how can it ever be fair to separate couples and families like that! I know of so many people separated from their spouses because of the insane regulations. It’s not like this is a Tory/UKIP thing. All of my traumatic years in the run up to settlement were during the Labour years. It was when I saw Nick Clegg talk sense in 2010 that I realised that the Liberal Democrats were the only human party in British Politics! 

As an MP’s caseworker for four years, I had to deal with some heartbreaking situations where a heartless Home Office didn’t even follow its own policies. Most of the time, I feel very proud to be British. I relish the leadership role that our government and Lynne Featherstone within it is taking on violence against women and girls, for example. However, the immigration system is too harsh, unfair and does not treat people with the dignity and respect they deserve. As a liberal and an internationalist I feel ashamed of it.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron’s Musings