Suella Braverman’s claim that “multiculturalism has failed” has been torn apart by people who say their own lives suggest otherwise.
The eyebrow-raising comment was part of the home secretary’s speech on migration to a centre-right think tank in Washington DC on Tuesday.
She took aim at the definition of a refugee and claimed being gay or a woman is not reason enough to grant someone international asylum.
Braverman also claimed there was a “misguided dogma of multiculturalism” in Europe, alleging that it had “failed” because it encourages people “to come to our society and live parallel lives in it”.
“They could be in this society, but not of this society. And in extreme cases, they could pursue lives aimed at undermining the stability and threatening the security of our society,” she added.
Braverman also used her platform to take aim at the number of people in the UK who are born “to foreign-born mothers”.
She then delved into how schools, accommodation and roads are all struggling with a growing population “due to immigration and high-birth rates”.
There is a growing population of people living in the UK who were born outside of the country.
According to lawyers at Immigration Advice Service, as of the year ending June 2022, there were an estimated 10,388,000 people in England and Wales who were not born in the UK – making up almost 15% of the UK’s total population.
Prompted by Braverman’s speech, people started to reveal how their own lives suggest that multiculturalism works on X (formerly Twitter), and explained how they’ve actively contributed to British society.
Others said you shouldn’t have to demonstrate your worth to be considered a successful part of British society.
Meanwhile, there was no shortage of people suggesting that the UK’s multiculturalism “is one of its greatest features” – and questioning why the Conservative Party is going down this route.