to wonder if this is really happening? parents are being asked to confirm if their kids are British born.

[someonestolemynick]

A few messages popped up on social media today by parents whose school asked them to confirm if the child in question is foreign born. One friend said this was being done by all schools today.
I don't have kids and am an EU national.
I have been disappointed by the referendum result but have adopted a "Wait and see" approach.
Yesterday's announcements of companies having to list foreign employees coupled with today's rumours is really freaking me out.

Have you been asked today to confirm your child's nationality by their school? Aibu to be fucking terrified?

To be fair, I think the government are at a complete loss about most things.

Used in the long run, I mean, not just the original intention of the data collection. The DPA notwithstanding.

"I sometimes fear that
people think that fascism arrives in fancy dress
worn by grotesques and monsters
as played out in endless re-runs of the Nazis.

Fascism arrives as your friend.
It will restore your honour,
make you feel proud,
protect your house,
give you a job,
clean up the neighbourhood,
remind you of how great you once were,
clear out the venal and the corrupt,
remove anything you feel is unlike you...

It doesn't walk in saying,
"Our programme means militias, mass imprisonments, transportations, war and persecution."

Michael Rosen

ItsAllGoingToBeFine

YY this clearly needs to be reminded to people.
I really a lot of people naive and innocent in front of issues like this. As if excess like that could never happen in the UK.
IMO They are dreaming. It CAN happen here too. If we let it happen.

It's guessing because they are no safeguarding in place to ensure that the data is used ONLY to improve teaching.

It wouldn't imagine it would be used just to improve teaching. The Government could use this information to help make all sorts of investment and policy decisions.... Or would you prefer Government to make these decisions in the dark.

And therein lies the problem Banana. The government needs information to best go about its business, but some are no longer sure just what business the government's in...

Some explanations as why this is a bad idea

And actually babanas other departments have already plenty of information available to make their decisions. Thankfully.
Or are you saying that until now, all decisions about investments, etc... Have been done wo having any idea of what sort of immigration there is the country/each county etc??

What they don't need is a list with the name of a child associated with their address, name of parents, where they born, nationally etc etc...
What other policy makers need is total numbers. And they have that already.

With the Nazi comparisons, what do you think the next step is? What is your concern as to where this will lead? I'm concerned about rising xenophobia but I'm not concerned not about state sanctioned attempts restrict the rights of EU citizens. Am I being naive?

Yes. You are being naive. The government has already said that EU citizens living in the UK are bargaining chips. It is not impossible that a hard Brexit could end with EU citizens being asked to leave, and it will certainly restrict the future rights of EU citizens within the UK.

Yes you are sorry.

My guess is that once Brexit is done and dusted, they will have the same immigration rule applied to everyone, EU citizen or not, having lived in the UK for 6 months or 30 years, married or not, with children or not.
And exactely in the same that they have send people 'back home' with the new immigration rules, they will do so with EU citizens.
It would make sense. Why two different rules for EU and no EU when they can do just one easier system?

And to do that, you need to know where they are ....

As for rights... If you expect to name and shame companies re the umber of foreign workers, then you expect that at the time of recruitment, your citizenship will make or break the deal regardless of how good it is. That's against the current Equality Act. But heyho...
At the moment, EU citizens do not have the same rights tha British one re benefits and housing. It has already been like this for a year. Despite the fact that some of those Eu citizens might well have been payng taxes for the last 20 years, just as their British counterparts.

So yes, there is already some restrictions in place and what TM is talking about is even more restriction and treating foreigners as second class citizens. It seems that the notion of equality has gone out of the window.

I'm uncomfortable with these steps being compared to those which led to the attempted extermination of the Jewish people.

Why? It's pretty accurate?

What do you mean?

Blaming the ills of the country on certain groups of people. Immigrants, benefit scroungers etc. Deliberately whipping up hatred against these groups so folk don't object to erosion of their rights. Set against a background of making Britain great again, regaining our sovereignty etc

I absolutely agree with everything you've just said but these are common trophes, politics works like this all the time.

Personally, I think that's about making sure that people don't ask to many questions about the way the economic system works - who wins and who loses. Divide and conquer.

My DC are grown up so this particular measure doesn't affect me. I am concerned though. Not about the collection of this data on its own, but combined with noises coming from the govt. about immigration generally, brexit and the insecurity of EU citizens that has resulted, the rise of the far right across europe, the new immigration act, the general sense that racism and xenophobia are somehow more acceptable post-brexit ...

My family will be fine, we're british for generations back but I have many colleagues and clients who were not born here and/or do not have british citizenship (EU and further afield) and many of them are extremely concerned.

Eddie this is something that needs to be discussed though. This data collection may be innocent but it's very unfortunately timed.

PP have said this: the Nazis, like all other totalitarian regimes, did not start deporting jews on the 30th January 1933. A lot of "little things" happened before. I remember my grandmother showing me a form she had to fill in during Hitler's regime detailing her ancestry back 5 generations. For census reasons.

SpaceUnicorn, SlottedSpoon and others

Thanks for asking. Our plans for getting out of the UK are going pretty well. It takes a little while to sell a house and liquidate assets, undertake an intensive language course etc but 'tis done and we will be out of here by Christmas (in time to get our 5 year residence permit before Art 50 is triggered) unless our house sale falls through. Course the tanking pound is not helping matters much.

I'm a little excited, hugely terrified, very sad but also very relieved to be off.

Someone, what further steps do you think are likely to be taken than will parallel this? Do you think the UK is on the way to establishing a totalitarian regime?

Do you think the UK is on the way to establishing a totalitarian regime?

I really, really hope not, but given that May plans to bypass parliament for much of Brexit, and given what they have do e so far I'm not convinced that human decent exists in the Tories to stop it. And the majority of the public is quite happy as it is happening to the "others" not them - hopefully when more people get affected they will understand what is happening and vote the Tories out.

As Universal Credit is more widely rolled out, there might be a shift in this view.

Eddie I really hope not but I'm growing more and more concerned. The authoritarian approach to Brexit (completely agree with ItsAllGoingToBeFine's last post), and the disgusting retgoric at the Tory conference (the infamous lists of foreign workers, Jeremy Hunt saying foreign doctors will only be welcome until 2025, Theresa May's view on Citizens of the world) and the way the media are not reporting it, is speaking for itself.

Today is school census day. There are two every year and have been for at least the last 25 years since I've been in teaching. Census requires name, dob, address, ethinicity, first language spoken, religion and any SEN requirement and whether the child is eligible for the pupil premium through disadvantage or through being in care. Service children are also registered. New this year was the need to submit an asssessment score for children will English as an additional language to rate fluency. I can't for the life of me think why anyone would find this disturbing - how else do you think that the dfe knows how to fund each school? The number of children you have on roll and the proportion of these that have special educational needs or English as an additional language needs directly effects funding - more SEN or EAL = more funding so you are shooting your school in the foot by refusing to disclose this basic information!

Next steps?

I don't necessarily think this will happen.

But for example government services are under great pressure after the cuts, and specifically in education recent legislation is preventing local authorities from opening new schools. A government or local authority might decide a quick and vote-winning "fix" would be to start reducing access to services for people designated "foreigners" (who are in the country perfectly legally and paying taxes). Creating a downward spiral of lack of access to education, employment and legal protections.

Thus artificially creating a group with multiple disadvantages who would become increasingly good scapegoats. Disadvantage tends to be associated with lack of access to the levers of power and ability to get one's voice heard, and sometimes with increased crime. So the scapegoating could then gather apace.

And would probably be enthusiastically stoked by those only too happy to distract from bigger questions about the economy, as you say.

It wouldn't necessarily be a totalitarian state, but a very nasty state if you were the Wrong Sort of Person. Although very nasty states are often totalitarian too, because they have to crush the resistance that unsurprisingly arises.

Of course all this doesn't have to come to pass.

But you asked what a "next steps" scenario could look like, so that's an example.