It’s a curious truth that the last government, which boasted far more first- and second-generation citizens of this country in high office than any previous administration – a visible triumph of postwar multiculturalism and integration – should have defined itself so raucously and divisively in its opposition to immigration. Nadhim Zahawi, who was one of those figures, and held a dizzying number of ministerial posts in quick succession as Tory administrations imploded (he was Boris Johnson’s chancellor for his last 24 hours in office) – describes himself in the title of this memoir as The Boy from Baghdad. The bleak irony of the fact that he served in cabinets that dehumanised refugees for political ends is nowhere mentioned.
Instead, Zahawi makes an impassioned case for the entrepreneurial resourcefulness and determination that migrants bring to the economy. “In the UK,” he writes, “it’s not uncommon to meet people who’ve fled politically or physically dangerous situations and made huge sacrifices for the sake of their family. Get in an Uber and you could lay money on meeting one. We take for granted these people will mop our floors and take care of our sick, but when you think they were the ones brave enough to leave, it woefully underestimates their capabilities. Harnessing that energy is just one of the reasons we need safe and legal routes for those fleeing persecution and tyranny.” Hear, hear, you may say; though if that sentiment was as vociferously expressed while Zahawi was chairman of the Tory party, it was drowned out in his colleagues’ shrill focus on hostile environments and ”stop the boats” and the Rwanda plan.
