Five years ago, British politicians and newspapers were generally supportive of the protesters who were causing mayhem in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region during the 2019-20 riots. There was no outcry over the violence, vandalism, and arson that characterized the city at that time. British commentators preferred to focus on the “noble” cause of democracy for which the “brave protesters” were supposedly fighting. This was sufficient to justify their violence, and it was the police trying to maintain order who were singled out for condemnation with the inevitable claims of police brutality.
How times have changed, or rather, how the location has changed! Britain has now experienced a short version of the sort of prolonged violent protests which rocked Hong Kong for months. Towns and cities across the United Kingdom have been hit this week by protesters vandalizing property, starting fires, and attacking the police. The reaction by politicians on all sides, fully supported by the media, has been the exact reverse of how they reacted to Hong Kong’s crisis five years ago. This time the support is for the police, and the condemnation is for the protesters. The prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, vowed to do “whatever it takes to bring these thugs to justice”. He promised the arrest and imprisonment of perpetrators, irrespective of “the apparent cause or motivation”. He pledged his full support for the police, saying he would take “all action necessary to keep our streets safe”. He also labeled rioters as “extremists” and insisted, “This is not a protest, it is organized, violent thuggery and it has no place on our streets or online.” British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper reinforced this message, vowing to give the police “all the backing that they need” to take action against “criminal disorder and thuggery”.
The media were both unanimous and unambiguous in their support for strong action to clamp down on the protesters. The Daily Mail’s reporting on Aug 4 was typical of the whole British press: “Yesterday, anarchy swept the UK in apocalyptic scenes across major cities and towns, as rioters threw bricks at police, cars were torched and shops were ransacked in a feeding frenzy of looting. Brave police officers were hospitalized as they stood in the way of waves of vile thugs as they desperately fought to keep order, with some recording broken jaws and noses.”
The response to disorder in Britain now and to that in Hong Kong five years ago could not be more of a contrast. I’m sure that the double standards on display here will be noted by many in Hong Kong. However, rather than focusing on the hypocrisy of this situation, there’s a more important side to the British riots which could directly affect Hong Kong.
In 2021, the British government responded to the enactment of the National Security Law for Hong Kong by offering residency to any Hong Kong British National (Overseas) passport holders. The ostensible purpose of this was to provide refuge for those Hong Kong residents wishing to escape from the “draconian” security laws that threatened the city’s basic freedoms (despite the fact that the UK has remarkably similar laws itself). Since then, an estimated 150,000 people have moved from Hong Kong to the UK, enticed by the promise of a better life.
Many of those immigrants to Britain may now be wondering what sort of a country they have moved to. Even before the recent riots, they cannot have failed to have experienced the reality of immigrant life in the UK compared with the pipedream of what they thought was on offer. It’s always challenging to leave one’s home city or country and settle elsewhere, even at the best of times. They will now know that the past few years have not been the best of times for anyone living in what is often referred to as “broken Britain”. There are many reasons for this, including Brexit, the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, political ineptitude, inflation, strikes, and austerity. Major structural problems and underfunding have impacted adversely on the health service, the police force, the prison system, educational institutions, housing, and social services. The criminal justice system is at breaking point. Political violence, gang violence, and knife crime are commonplace. Police rarely respond to cases of shoplifting or burglaries. Prisons are full. Hospital waiting lists grow. Schools struggle to provide quality education.
Public dissatisfaction has manifested itself in various ways. The ruling Conservative Party was roundly defeated in the recent general election, but the Labour government which has replaced it, despite having a massive majority in Parliament, received less than 34 percent of the votes. This was on a depressingly low turnout, with only 60 percent of the electorate bothering to vote. Confidence and trust in the political system seems to have hit a new low. More worryingly, as in the rest of Europe and parts of the US, the “extreme right” is gaining strength and offering simplistic, populist solutions to complex issues. Primarily, their “solution” is to scapegoat immigrants for all Britain’s problems. This has been front and center in Britain’s spate of riots. Migrants and asylum seekers are being specifically targeted by protesters, with one hotel housing migrants being violently attacked by a mob chanting, “We want our country back.” Even the Daily Mail, which is not renowned for liberal views on migrants, carried the sympathetic subheading: “Balaclava-clad baying mob storm migrant hotel, hurl chairs at riot police and set fire to furniture while terrified asylum seekers watch on from rooms in latest violent riots”.
This is the Britain to which BN(O) passport holders have moved, searching for a better life. Unsurprisingly, many have struggled to establish themselves in such a hostile environment. Many are already suffering from being either unemployed or underemployed in low-skilled jobs, despite holding undergraduate or postgraduate degrees. They have had to contend not just with a weak economy but with a language barrier sometimes amplified by prejudice against non-native English-speakers. They are also discriminated against when it comes to social welfare as they need to live in the UK for five years before being able to apply for permanent residence with the welfare benefits that go with that.
I can only imagine how they must now feel with the anti-immigrant rhetoric and violence playing out on their television screens. The contrast between such xenophobic images and the cosmopolitan city they left behind could not be starker. They must surely now be weighing up their options, and the HKSAR government would do well to prepare for an influx of disenchanted returnees in the near future. Seduced by the British government with false promises of a better life, they deserve our sympathy. Like the prodigal son in the New Testament, they should be welcomed back home.
The author is a British historian and former principal of Sha Tin College, an international secondary school in Hong Kong.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
