The risk profile for "I have indefinite leave to remain" has moved from "this won't be an issue at all" to "we have no trust in the government on this" in a few short years.
Profoundly depressing
It is not a matter of trust. Unless you are a citizen your right to remain in a country is always subject to the approval of the government and rules can change. it is the point of the distinction between "indefinite leave to remain" and citizenship.
I have noticed that only white people commit to living in the UK without becoming citizens. Sindhu Vee is very funny about that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8DNgi5Tok4&t=90s
Alas, you've not discovered a hidden pattern, except maybe a hidden pattern in the kinds of people you socialize with. Chinese nationals cannot hold dual citizenship, and renouncing their Chinese citizenship creates very serious complications, including around property and inheritance when parents die, which you would be aware of if you knew any Chinese person well enough to have had this conversation with them.
Based on gov.uk immigration system statistics data and tables, among those with indefinite leave to remain, the most likely to seek citizenship are British Overseas Citizens, Austrians and Lithuanians. The least likely are Moroccans and Venezuelans.
Weird in the Venezuelans case, as there is no restrictions for double nationality and having only Venezuelan citizenship doesn't have many advantages. I would guess that it is because most Venezuelans living there already have an European passport due to parents/grandparent, so no need/can't get a third
If they are permanently settled in the UK surely it would be better to have British citizenship rather than that of a country they do not live in?
The nationalities listed are all very small groups in the UK. maybe they are not really permanently settled? Someone who moves somewhere for work might end up living there a decade (and in the UK that would mean getting indefinite leave to remain) and then returning.
Could you link to the stats showing that? What about all the other countries? What is the position of BNOs?
Indefinite leave to remain is not the same as permanently settled - there is a difference between long term and the rest of your life.
- cost: ~2k
- time: 2 exams
- paperwork required to keep other nationalities in some cases
- after feb 2026, you can only re-enter the UK with a British passport (more cost) or with extra paperwork to enable your other passport (more costs ~500)
The same goes for the cost of British citizenship. once you have it its just the cost of renewing passports (about £100/decade at current rates) for the rest of your life. That £2,000 is much less than the cost of renewing some types or residence visa and gives you the security of being a citizen.
My personal reason is that I travel a lot, so I never meet the physical presence within the country requirements.
I have plenty of friends who otherwise would apply, and ILR should be sufficient in a democratic government following social and political contracts.
The UK will help circumvent this for current British citizens when they acquire new citizenship in one of those countries (eg. America famously makes you hand over your old passport, but the UK will happily ship you a replacement in an unmarked envelope), but that doesn't really work so well in the other direction.
It does seem scarily likely, but he still has a few years to really screw things up before we get there. Fingers crossed.
Without a large-scale cock-up, I don't see Starmer as inspiring enough to stop him unfortunately. Lets hope someone else steps up to the plate with a bit more charisma.
About the only thing that can stop them is the Tories holding onto relevance enough to split their vote again.
> Reform would get in and throw out all the "undesirables" (basically anyone without a British Passport at first, sure they won't stop there)
I think that is an exaggerated view from a distance. I see no evidence they can do that, or want to. At the time of the Brexit campaign Farage said he wanted skilled immigrants (he gave the example of Indian doctors immigrating in the 1970s as the wort of thing he wanted). Nor can the country afford to lose skilled people. Its worth remembering that Reform would not agree to what Elon Musk wanted in return for funding so I think its safe to assume Reform would not be as extreme as the current US government.
I am of foreign birth, as is my younger daughter (she was born abroad) and I am not particularly worried. I would worry if Rupert Lowe's Restore party started making gains, or Ben Habib's Advance party.
> I'm really not sure how likely them attaining power
They are doing well in the polls now but my feeling is they are peaking. Letting on too many Conservative defectors makes them look at lot less of an anti-establishment party (a huge part of their appeal) and they are becoming too extreme (I think in reaction to the splash, mostly on social media) made by Advance and Restore (one of those is what Elon Musk endorses, so that gives you an idea where they are).
The net immigration numbers are falling!
I disagree about the public. Its very clear that the opposition to immigration is almost entirely about small boats and illegal entry.
As for skin colour, of the tiny number or racists I have heard of in real life, one comment repeated back to me made it clear the person involved preferred at least some Asians (those with skills etc.) to Eastern Europeans.
No, that's just the current talking point.
A decade ago, small boats not in the news, somehow managed to still be a big talking point on Brexit campaign. Worse, part of the Brexit campaign was scare-mongering that the EU had made it so the UK had no control over its borders, no control over its immigration laws, and even had one poster further scare-mongering that the UK would be forced to allow in the entire population of Turkey* even though Turkey wasn't actually in the EU nor did anyone think it would get in any time soon and the UK had a veto on expansion anyway (plus the more fundamental pretentiousness in thinking they'd want to come en-masse anyway, given that Turkish people are like everyone else, in that almost none of them really care for the idea of moving to the UK).
Even for "unlawful entry" of asylum seekers who were still allowed to lawfully claim asylum, the UK was part of the Dublin III system, which oh-so-conveniently meant the UK could argue that all the other countries most people would need to go through to get to the UK should have taken them first, to which I'd like to say this:
J'ai obtenu la note D au GCSE de français, et pourtant j'ai étudié la langue à l'école. À votre avis, comment un demandeur d'asile lambda originaire de l'ancien Empire britannique va-t-il s'en sortir?
Most asylum seekers do, in fact, stop at the first safe country; the UK has always only had a tiny fraction of the total, and loses its collective mind anyway.
* Note my careful phrasing and also their careful phrasing in this specific ad; they note the population to give the implication, I did not say they said all of them will come in**, only that they said all of them must be allowed to, when EU membership never did any such thing: https://www.wsj.com/articles/with-brexit-turkey-loses-its-bi... and https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2018/07/facebook-relea...
** apparently one of the "senior Brexiteers" did, but I can't trivially find any actual citation and don't care to put in the effort to look harder
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/feb/22/reform-uk-i...
I have lived in several parts of the UK, have friends in many more. I currently live in a very white village. I am visible ethnic minority. I see no sign of racism. I know of a few overt racists at second or third hand (they know someone who knows someone I know).
There is lots of racism on social media, but even most of that is in reaction to ragebait posts, some posted by people who are not even British.