In 2012, the ‘no recourse to public funds’ (NRPF) condition was extended to long-standing migrant families in the UK who had previously achieved rights to residence and welfare through human rights mechanisms. Through close examination of policy, political statements, and media coverage, we make the case that the NRPF extension was – and continues to be – intentionally subjugating and punitive, most aptly understood as a policy of enforced destitution and debt imposed on negatively-racialised post-colonial subjects. In drawing out the implications of our argument, we point to time, destitution, and debt as core technologies of the UK’s migration regime, alongside everyday bordering, detention, and deportability. Denying support through NRPF serves to exclude putatively included migrants while normalising conditional approaches to social support. Our article reveals why moral arguments against NRPF based on destitution fail and suggests that challenging welfare bordering requires a more systemic appraisal of policy frames, intentions and effects.
The interim briefing presents initial findings from a project exploring the support available to migrants with no recourse to public funds during the COVID-19 pandemic.<div><br></div><div>The research included a survey of local authorities in England, and a call for evidence from migrant support organisations in England, Scotland and Wales. </div><div><br></div><div>More than 90 percent of local authorities had not shared information about support for people with NRPF during the pandemic, and support organisations reported that service users had struggled to access food, shelter and subsistence support during the pandemic.</div>
In July 2012, major changes to the family migration rules were made in the UK, severely restricting British and settled residents’ rights to sponsor non-EEA family members. However, little is known about how they have been experienced in practice, particularly by the South Asian families they target. Our article draws on policy and media analysis alongside original qualitative research to shed light on how the 2012 family migration rules have impacted British Bangladeshis, and with what consequences for their experiences of citizenship and the possibilities of them leading transnational lives. We argue that the rules amount to a raced, gendered, and classed ‘attack’ on both transnationalism and citizenship and suggest that, while transnationalism and citizenship are often analysed separately, they are in fact deeply intertwined.
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