Shabana Mahmood

Shabana Mahmood

Labour — Birmingham Ladywood

Speaking in the House of Commons on 2 November 2026

Debate

Immigration: Earned Settlement

Contribution

I thank my hon. Friend for those remarks. He is absolutely right: there is quite a lot of projection that happens when you are a brown Muslim woman in the world of politics, but I am, alas, used to it. On rebuilding public trust, as I said in my statement, solidarity is a precondition of social justice. If we are to have a system based on taxation for universal public services, people need to know that everyone is contributing into the same collective pot that we can all then rely upon when we need to. That is how we maintain social cohesion in this country. A managed system where the Government are in control—where it is not people smugglers who decide who gets to come into our country, but the Government who make that choice, with the consent of the British people—is absolutely the way to ensure that we have social cohesion and strong communities all over our country.

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