UK peers back Indians stuck in professional visa imbroglio

Peers from Britain’s House of Lords have backed Indian professionals caught up in a visa row over their right to live and work in the UK, terming the government’s treatment of skilled workers from countries outside the European Union ( EU) as a “national scandal”.

During a debate on “Immigration: Hostile Environment” in the House of Lords on Thursday, Lord Dick Taverne, a Liberal Democrat peer said, “This treatment is a national scandal every bit as outrageous as the treatment of the Windrush immigrants.

◗ House of Lords have backed Indian professionals caught up in a visa row over their right to live and work in the UK, terming the government’s treatment of skilled workers from countries outside the EU

A monstrous injustice is being perpetrated by our government in our name.”

“If it is not remedied, the Home Office will not only be breaking every canon of a civilised society, but ignoring one of the most basic tenets of the rule of law — the golden rule that someone is assumed innocent until proved guilty,” he said.

Lord Taverne has been leading a parliamentary campaign in favour of professionals affected by the issue of their indefinite leave to remain ( ILR) being denied as a result of an immigration clause aimed at terrorists and criminal convicts.

“Their only error is one that half a million British taxpayers make every year. Native taxpayers amend their tax returns without facing any penalty — not even a fine — but the Home Office treats migrants who do as terrorists,” he told the House.