Wandsworth in south London has been a citadel of Conservative civic leadership for four decades.
It was famously Margaret Thatchers favourite local council – and it might be going red.
In the capital Conservatives had already feared a local election drubbing from Remain voters and Corbyn supporters – and this Windrush crisis has not helped.
People on the High Street said the treatment of fellow Brits made them ashamed.
One member of the Windrush Generation, Beryl, a care worker originally from Jamaica, said it was sad that many people like her who had not formalised their nationality, had been treated so badly.
"I swore allegiance to the Queen, I sorted it out for myself otherwise I would have been in the same boat," she said.
The Government, Beryl says, "could have done better".
Individual stories of incredible treatment by the Home Office continue to emerge.
The latest extraordinary case involves the Government threatening to deport a pensioner ex-lollipop lady here for 44 years, after arriving from Canada, with the words: "life in the UK will become increasingly difficult".
The Government's "hostile environment" risks being reciprocated at local elections predominantly in London and the big cities of England next week.
Former chair of the Conservatives Baroness Sayeeda Warsi told Sky News there is something more troubling going on.
"Of course because of the Windrush tragedy we are going to find people who find it difficult to vote for us, but this much broader," she said.
"I genuinely feel that much of the progress made in the David Cameron detoxification process has been damaged".
She points specifically to the London Mayoral campaign of Zac Goldsmith against Sadiq Khan – a fight followed by Mr Goldsmith's reendorsement as MP with a refusal to acknowledge regret for behaviour that required Cabinet level apologies.
There is also the recent use in Havering of Conservative election literature that says the borough is "in danger" of becoming like Hackney and Newham, should people vote Labour.
:: Tories heading for record all time low in London local elections
The broader point is that Conservative strategy, post-Brexit, is to reunite the right by bringing together the Conservative vote with ex UKIP-voters.
It worked spectacularly at last year's shire local elections.
It then failed spectacularly at the General Election, losing the government its majority.
It requires an uncompromising line on immigration and Brexit. But, naturally, it makes the Tory coalition of right wing and liberal Britain, that actually won a majority in 2015, impossible.
Britain, however, is not just London.
Dudley council in the Midlands is a top Tory target due to potential UKIP switchers.
Cabinet ministers including the PM have been making regular visits and the "hostile environment" for illegal immigration remains popular, despite sympathy for victims of the Windrush crisis.
In Parliament Square a statue of suffragist Millicent Fawcett was unveiled.
Concerns about the retoxification of the Tory brand are most visibly seen in the now regular polling leads for Labour amongst women, and especially young women, also a group which polls suggest has been most concerned about the Government approach to Brexit.
Labour, of course, has had its own acute issues over antisemitism in the past few weeks.
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But the Government approach and political strategy is also on the line, and the Windrush crisis shows little sign of ending either.
A reckoning for all of this may await next week's council election result.
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