In her book The Enemy Within, former Tory minister Baroness Sayeeda Warsi mentions how, as a teenager, she would have animated conversations with her parents about her family’s future in Britain. Her mother worried about “things becoming so difficult in the UK” that one day “we might have to leave”. In her twenties, she recalls how she would have “heated conversations” with her, insisting that “British Pakistanis…were an intrinsic part” of Britain, a “multicultural nation”. And yet later, by the time she was in her forties, Baroness Warsi found herself worrying as her mother did about “things getting tough”, and she discovered “these conversations are now happening again” amongst people of her own generation. Azeem Rafiq’s experience of “institutional” racism within cricket is only a part of this conversation. And a recent development may prove that Warsi’s parents’ views may not be completely unfounded.

Clause 9 of the recently amended Nationality and Borders Bill – “Notice of decision to deprive a person of citizenship” – would strip individuals of their British citizenship without warning, even if they were born and raised in the UK. This would apply if it was “in the interest of the relationship between the United Kingdom and another country” or “otherwise in the national interest”.

Commenting on the bill, Maya Foa of the human rights group Reprieve said: “This clause would give [British Home Secretary] Priti Patel unprecedented power to remove your citizenship in secret, without even having to tell you, and effectively deny you an appeal. Under this regime, a person accused of speeding would be afforded more rights than someone at risk of being deprived of their British nationality” and that even “[t]he US government has condemned citizenship-stripping as a dangerous denial of responsibility for your own nationals.”

The Home Office asserted that: “British citizenship is a privilege, not a right…The nationality and borders bill will amend the law so citizenship can be deprived where it is not practicable to give notice, for example if there is no way of communicating with the person.” This appears to contradict Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to which the UK is a signatory. The article states clearly that “[e]veryone has the right to a nationality”.

In pre-modern times, inhabitants of lands where there were no such provisions would face the prospect of being stripped of their citizenship and being expelled from the country of their birth.

Sultan Bayazid II sent an Ottoman flotilla in July 1492 to rescue both Jews and Muslims who were being expelled by Spain’s rulers (Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile) during the Inquisition. He then gave them permission to settle in the Ottoman state and become Ottoman citizens; they were also given the opportunity to be of service to the Sultanate. He ridiculed the behaviour of the Spanish rulers by pointing out the absurdity of expelling people who were of such benefit to Spain: “You venture to call Ferdinand a wise ruler … he who has impoverished his own country and enriched mine,” as we read in the ‘Jewish Encyclopedia’ by Singer.

However, we do not have to delve too deep into the past to cite examples of deprivation of citizenship closer to home. As a result of legislation, from 1870 to 1914, British women who married foreign nationals would lose their citizenship, and there was no substantive change to the content of the law until 1948. And between 1907 and 1922, women in the US were also stripped of their American status if they married an ‘alien’.

Returning to the current situation in the UK, the Government appears to have miscalculated in their attempts to introduce the deprivation provisions quietly by amending the bill at the committee stage. British citizens of non-white ethnic origin and who may have been born in Britain have reacted angrily and there has been an uproar on social media. But it could well be that, when the bill is passed on to the House of Lords, there could be significant revisions.