Under a post-Brexit approach for EU nationals convicted of crimes, a 28-year-old man who was born in Britain and has never left the nation has talked of his despair at being told he will be deported to Portugal, where his parents arrived more than 30 years ago.
Dmitry Lima was born in Lambeth, a neighbourhood in south London. He does not speak Portuguese and has never gone outside the UK, yet the Home Office issued a deportation order for him after he served time in jail for possession of a Taser and drug offences.
Lima is appealing the deportation judgment since he is British and did not apply for a UK passport before because he could not pay the fees. Lima has no prior convictions. “I just don’t understand; I’m British, and I’ve never left the country,” he remarked.
Changes implemented following Brexit state that deporting an EU national who has served more than 12 months in prison is considered “conducive to the public good and in the public interest,” much like deporting a person of any other nationality.
Before, only “serious grounds of public policy and public security” would have allowed EU nationals who had been convicted of a crime and lived in the UK for five years to be deported; for those who had been there continuously, the bar was raised to “imperative grounds of public security.”
In August 2020, Lima was found guilty on two charges of possessing a class A narcotic to provide it and of possessing a prohibited weapon. He was given a sentence of four years and six months in prison, which he completed just over two years later.
After being transferred from prison to the Brook House immigration removal centre at Gatwick Airport, he was served with a deportation order in October 2022.
Lima argues in his appeal against deportation that he is a citizen of the United Kingdom because his parents settled there.
Within his appeal package, he enclosed a personal statement, noting, “It would be devastating, both mentally and emotionally, to lose the life I’ve built in the UK.” “I have lived in the UK my entire life, so I consider it to be my home.”
“I completely admit my wrongdoing and have been serving my sentence as a consequence,” he continued. After prison, I intended to start again and atone for my transgressions. Regretfully, after serving my time in jail, I was placed in a detention centre and issued a deportation order. I’m in a condition of uncertainty due to the deportation order, which is upsetting both financially and emotionally.
The government introduced the British nationality (regularisation of past practice) bill in May 2023, seemingly acknowledging Lima and others’ situation. The bill aims to treat individuals as British if their parents arrived in the UK before 2000 through the EU’s right to free movement. However, it has not yet been put into effect.
Naga Khan, Lima’s attorney, claimed the Home Office didn’t seem to have any documentation of his client’s presence in the UK. “Lima is a continuous resident of the UK from birth and is therefore entitled to British citizenship,” he stated, citing the actions of her late father and mother in exercising their rights under EU treaties.
You really couldn’t make this up, could you?
When there are no genuine procedures in place and mass immigration is encouraged, this is what occurs. Not counting individuals who entered the nation illegally, over 3 million immigrants were permitted to enter during the Blair years. Now, the entire system appears to be unusable and in need of a thorough redesign.
Many employees at the Home Office need to be fired or retrained because they are unfit for their jobs. Most likely, many of them are immigrants!
They’re all just spongers hiding behind one meeting after another and pushing pens. They would be far more selective about who they hired if they were handling their own money.
Since most of them are uneducated and stupid, they should all be fired. This is what happens when public servants believe they are superior to elected officials.
A few heads ought to be rolling in the home office divisions as well, in my opinion. It’s not using common sense. Or are all of them automata?
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 