Kate Kent moved to the UK from Malaysia and has spent £10,000 over six years to be here legally. As a legal migrant there is one phrase that makes her stomach turn

Every time I get pulled into a conversation about migration, I have to brace myself. As a migrant, I often get asked for my thoughts about asylum seekers and refugees arriving in the most dangerous ways possible, all for a chance to eke out a living in Britain.

My go-to response, which is also the one I really believe in, is that I think people fleeing unlivable circumstances in far-flung countries, whether it’s war, poverty, or discrimination, deserve that chance just as much as anyone else. All I can do is hope the other person will agree.

But there are times when I find myself dreading what comes next. There is a particular reply that truly makes me squirm and turns my stomach. Even after more than six years of living in this country, having moved here in 2019 as the spouse of a British citizen, these words still get to me: “Well, at least you came here legally”.

It is always said with a tone of complicity, as though we’re both in on a joke that I want no part of. There’s a bit of a wink and a nudge, as if to suggest I should be pleased with myself, that I should be smug about having come “the right way”. They also seem to be reassuring themselves, almost sighing in relief to be in conversation with a legal migrant.

I hate it when it comes up, and with the recent discourse around migration growing more toxic by the minute, it’s become even more frequent. With every protest at a hotel housing asylum seekers and every St George’s cross that gets daubed on available white space – even on roundabouts, which is perhaps the most bizarrely mundane show of patriotism I’ve ever witnessed – the way we talk about migrants becomes increasingly inhumane and disgusting, and apparently, I’m supposed to agree with all of it.

In one conversation, when I was talking about how difficult it is to get on the housing ladder here, the person wiggled their eyebrows and exclaimed: “You should’ve come here on a boat, then you would’ve gotten a free house!”

They looked at me, waiting for me to agree or even join in with the “banter”. They were hoping, I thought afterwards, to get a signal from me that it’s fine to have a laugh about it; that legal migrants also hate illegal migrants, so it’s OK for them to say it out loud.

My presence in the UK was made possible through a legal migration route and the path to citizenship has been long. I am Malaysia-born and bred and first came to the UK for university. Then I fell in love with a British citizen, got married and I haven’t looked back. I work hard, pay my taxes and consider London to be my forever home. But while it hasn’t been an easy ride, I’m not ashamed to say that all I’ve done is pay to be here.

I’m privileged enough to have come from a middle-class family that could afford to send me to university. From there, I scraped enough money together every year to be able to afford each visa and eventually, citizenship. All I’ve done is hand money over. If everyone had the means to do so, they would. But considering I’ve spent around £10,000 over the last six years, it’s not feasible for most, especially not for those living in countries being ripped apart by war and poverty.

I want to believe the people who pat me on the back for being here legally mean well. Many of them do, and they are frustrated by a system that they fear is ignoring their concerns around migration. I can understand it. I’m not saying there are no problems whatsoever; of course there are going to be people who come with bad intentions and commit criminal activity. And the issues with housing and the NHS that Britain already faces are bad enough without public figures claiming asylum seekers are getting benefits like four-star hotels and free iPads, which only serves to rile up even more hatred.

A comment I often hear is that legal migrants have to pay to use the NHS, so why should illegal migrants get to use it for free? As someone who has had to pay thousands for the Immigration Health Surcharge over the last six years, I get it – but I also don’t want people who have come here with no money and who aren’t even allowed to work while their claims are being processed to suffer from illness and injury. In my opinion, it’s like refusing to let taxpayer money be used to pay for children to have free school meals. Why not? It’s not the fault of asylum seekers and kids if taxpayer money is being wasted by the government; it’s the latter we should be angry at.

We’ve lost sight of our humanity when it comes to conversations like these. Since Brexit, it has somehow become more and more acceptable to use words like “invasion” and “swarm” when referring to immigration, both legal and illegal. It instills fear that infiltrates every community, dividing us further when really, we should be wanting to know each other more deeply. Just for a moment, I hope we allow ourselves to imagine stepping into someone else’s shoes and feel deeply what it might be like. I worry that if we don’t, the “at least you’re legal!” conversations may sour and turn uglier. I fear they already have.