The UK’s hostile environment is spreading. Just days ago, the country was downgraded in an annual global index of civic freedoms, as a result of the government’s “increasingly authoritarian” approach towards bodies that speak out against policies on anti-racism, refugee and asylum seeker rights, and the climate crisis. The Tory obsession with immigration in general, and lately small boats in particular, has become a gateway for even wider oppression. The Gary Lineker affair seemed like a victory, but really it was a warning. He is reinstalled, the BBC is cowed, and the Conservatives are nursing a bloody nose having lost...