A French philosopher who has been barred from entering the UK due to his controversial views on immigration is preparing to challenge the Home Office’s decision with the support of the Free Speech Union (FSU).
Renaud Camus, the writer associated with the so-called “great replacement” theory – which argues that Europe’s indigenous populations are being gradually displaced by migrants – was due to speak in Britain later this month. However, he was blocked from travelling after the Home Office concluded that his presence in the country would not be “conducive to the public good”.
The decision has triggered concern among free speech advocates, and comes at a time when the UK Government is being urged to avoid sending the wrong signal on freedom of expression during sensitive trade negotiations with Donald Trump’s administration.
Mr Camus now intends to appeal the ban, with assistance from the FSU, whose work defending individuals against censorship and cancellation is overseen by its chairman, Conservative peer Lord Young.
The Home Office’s decision was communicated via email, informing Mr Camus that his application for electronic travel authorisation had been refused. “Your presence in the UK is not considered to be conducive to the public good,” it read.
Lord Young confirmed that the FSU has offered to help. “We’ve reached out to him to see if he’d like any help in appealing this decision, and he said yes,” he told The Telegraph. “So I anticipate that we are going to be getting an immigration lawyer on the case.”
He added that it was “wrong” for the Government to block Mr Camus from entering the country. “I don’t think that the common good is endangered by inviting people to set out their contentious views in the public square, particularly not someone as distinguished as Mr Camus,” he said.
Mr Camus had been scheduled to address an event organised by the nationalist and anti-immigration Homeland Party. He also claimed he had been invited to debate at the Oxford Union later this year, although those plans are now uncertain in light of the ban.
The 78-year-old author has argued that unchecked immigration will result in the demographic “replacement” of native European populations has led critics to brand him a conspiracy theorist and white nationalist.
In 2012, he published The Great Replacement, a book influenced by Jean Raspail’s dystopian novel The Camp of the Saints, in which he set out his theory that white Europeans “are being reverse colonized by Black and Brown immigrants, who are flooding the Continent in what amounts to an extinction-level event”. Camus insists his arguments are cultural and civilisational, rather than biological or racial, and has denied advocating violence or racial hatred.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Mr Camus said: “Of all the European governments guilty of allowing unchecked migration, the British Government is one of the guiltiest.
“No wonder it does not want me to speak,” he added.
Mr Camus appears to have been excluded under Section 3(5)(a) of the Immigration Act 1971, which provides the Home Secretary with the power to deport or refuse entry to any non-UK national if their presence is deemed “not conducive to the public good”.
Although originally conceived as a national security measure, the scope of the power has since expanded through Home Office policy guidance, which now allows exclusion on broader public interest grounds, including the potential for an individual’s views to foster inter-community tension, incite hatred, or otherwise undermine social cohesion.
Importantly, exclusion can occur even in the absence of any criminal conviction, and does not require intent to incite violence or disorder. Decisions of this kind are not governed by statute but by executive discretion, making them difficult to challenge except by judicial review on procedural or proportionality grounds, often invoking rights under Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
Whether one agrees with Mr Camus or not, the free speech implications are difficult to ignore. Labelling a theory as objectionable does not make it disappear, and barring its proponent from entering the country does little to persuade others that it is wrong.
Among advocates of classical liberalism and pluralist democracy, counter-speech has long been recognised as the most effective means of challenging ideas in the public square. It allows for flawed arguments to be exposed, assumptions to be tested, and, where necessary, for dangerous or misguided theories to be defeated through reasoned debate rather than administrative exclusion.
