Secondly, I am pretty sure a biometric permit isn't required. Where is this requirement coming from?
It's been a requirement for non-EU migrants for years. to be able to work or access services. We can travel on our passports - apparently our old paper visas are safe enough for that - but anything else my ILR was meant to be used for has been been replaced by BRP (which apparently won't be safe enough in 2025). There has been a lot of talk about how to fold everyone into one system, that EU citizens might have similar requirements in the future, but so much is still vague about how things are going to move forward - another reason many, EU and non-EU, are pushing for citizenship where possible -- but I'm four years into actively going for citizenship. Many trying now will likely face some of the changes ahead.
I do however think there needs to be some kind of border control to reside in countries. They also have to think of the standard of living of their own citizens above all else. If they had opened borders for anyone from anywhere they would soon be overwhelmed.
I’m taking about the US for example and if they opened their borders now and there was no immigration control at all, very soon they would have millions upon millions of people moving there. Great for those seeking a better life, but equally where do you draw the line. The impact upon its current citizens has to be taken in to account.
You mean how the US, Canada, Australia and most of the world ended up as they are today?
I'm mixed American Indigenous and European and well aware of the risks of open borders - it's kinda written on my face. That doesn't change that it's a government power that did not always exist and that discussing those powers as rights for governments not to be questioned or complained about as was discussed earlier in this thread has risks too. The idea we should view what the government allows us as a honour is dangerous.
And as someone who left the US and can't get many financial products because of American extraterritorial laws and all the other joys of FATCA, I'm also well aware that government power today has creeped well beyond their own borders. The power creep is not and has never been for our benefit, even when try to justify it that way. There are many ways things have been and could be handled beyond what's going on now, just like issues that brought Brexit it to the forefront could have been dealt with, but the government chose not to.
There are already methods for controling access to public funds that the UK uses (the reason why my spouse gets child benefit and I don't), better ways for people to move without the rights and responsibilities of citizenship, but maybe not as profittable for all those "private partners" and so good at stirring up things for elections. How can they say they're being hard on immigration if they can't add dozens of new rules every year that do absolutely fuckall to the number of immigrants there are?