Perhaps the most radical of the reforms, the White Paper emphasizes that “individuals should earn their right to privileged immigration status in the UK through the long-term contribution they bring to our country “.

While it has long been the case that both settlement (also known as permanent residency or indefinite leave to remain) and citizenship are earned through establishing strong ties to the UK, the White Paper states that “people should contribute to the economy and society before gaining settled status in our country”.

For many visa categories, settlement can currently be granted after five years’ lawful residence in the UK, along with demonstrating an intermediate level of English and a knowledge of life in UK.  One year after obtaining settlement, individuals may be able to apply for British citizenship, provided they met the rules to do so.

The new reforms would see this qualifying period for settlement doubled to ten years in the UK as a standard, although indicates that there will be exceptions for migrants who make “contributions” to the UK.  There is as yet no detail available on how such contributions will be assessed, but the White Paper indicates that the Government will commence a consultation on this in the autumn.

For non-UK dependents of British citizens, settlement will continue to be possible after five years’ lawful residence in the UK.

The Life in the UK Test will also be “refreshed” but again there is no clarity on what this will entail.

Migrants who come to the UK for the purposes of work or study (provided certain conditions are met) may be able to bring their spouses/partners and children under the age of 18 with them as their dependants. Currently, there is no English language requirement for dependent spouses or partners. With the purported purpose of aiding integration to life in the UK for dependants, the Government will introduction an English language requirement for such applicants at level A1 (beginners’ level) of the Common European Framework of Reference for an initial application, rising to A2 (upper beginners’ level) for any visa extension and level B2 (upper intermediate level) for settlement.

The White Paper states that international students contribute over £12 billion a year in tuition fees to high education institutions in the UK and the UK’s research sector.  Additionally, the White Paper acknowledges that international students at UK universities generate an estimated £20.65 billion in exports through living expenditure and tuition fees in 2021.  In short, international students are big business for the UK.

Nevertheless, it states that some individuals do not genuinely intend to study in the UK, and use the Student visa system as a vehicle to relocate themselves and their family.  The Paper states that approximately 30% of asylum applicants have a visa to live in the UK at the point of application, almost half (47%) of these applicants have a student visa. 

In seeking to attract genuine and skilled students, the Government state that they will:

• Strengthen the requirements that all sponsoring institutions must meet in order to recruit international students.
• Introduce tighter compliance measures for educational institutions which sponsor students by raising the minimum pass requirement of each Basic Compliance Assessment (BCA) metric by five percentage points, so that a sponsor must maintain a course enrolment rate of at least 95% and a course completion rate of 90% in order to pass the compliance threshold.
• Implement a new Red-Amber-Green banding system to rate the BCA performance of each sponsor, so that it is clear to the Home Office and the public which institutions are achieving a high rate of compliance, and which are at risk of failing.
• Introduce new interventions for sponsors who are close to failing their metrics, including placing them on a bespoke action plan designed to improve their compliance, and imposing limits on the number of new international students they can recruit while they are subject to those plans.
• Require all sponsors wishing to use recruitment agents for overseas students to sign up to the Agent Quality Framework, designed to maintain the highest standards of agent management, and ensure that institutions cannot simply outsource their responsibility to ensure that the individuals whose visas they are sponsoring are genuinely coming to the UK to study.
• Require sponsoring institutions to demonstrate that they are considering local impacts when taking its decisions on international recruitment.
• Review the Short-Term Study accreditation bodies to ensure that their processes are robust and consider what further checks need to be put in place to ensure the right level of scrutiny is being applied both before an organisation is accredited, and when that accreditation is renewed.
• Consider introducing a levy on the income generated by international students to be reinvested into skills.

A Graduate visa allows migrants who held Student visas and have graduated from a degree-level or above course of study at a UK university, to apply for a two-year visa (or three years for PhD students) at the end of their studies which allows them to work in the UK without the need for sponsorship. This visa is crucial part of education policy, serving as an incentive for international students to choose to study in the UK by allowing pathway to remain post-graduation to work.

The Government asked the MAC to review the visa route and as a result has identified  that while many Graduate visa holders find employment quickly upon graduating, many do not go into graduate-level roles, but into low-skilled employment.

Accordingly, the Government has thus decided  the duration of the Graduate visa from two years to 18 months, rather than requiring a Graduate visa holder to undertake a Graduate level position.

The Government will seek to expand the reach of the Global Talent visa route to encourage applications from leaders & future leaders and entrepreneurs.  Additionally, changes to the UK Expansion Worker visa route and High Potential Individuals routes are proposed, to increase opportunities for potential applicants.

The Government states that they will:

• Increase opportunities for Global Talent applicants by increasing places on schemes for research interns, including those working in the field of Artificial Intelligence, to allow businesses access to additional promising young talent.
  • Introduce reforms to make it easier for top scientific and design talent to use the Global Talent visa route.Possibly introduce a Fast Track for endorsement for those with “the right skills”
• • Review the Innovator Founder visa to ensure that it supports entrepreneurial talent currently studying at UK universities to move into the visa so that they can build their business and career in the UK.Double the number of workers that an overseas business can send to the UK with the aim of establishing a presence in the UK.
  • Explore the possibility for a targeted and capped expansion of the High Potential Individual visa route with a view to doubling the number of qualifying institutions.

Whilst acknowledging that there has been no policy to increase the domestic labour support or encourage inactive domestic labour back into work, coupled with a broken welfare system and lack of action to support people to come off benefits and enter the workforce, which in turn places pressure on employers to recruit from abroad, the White Paper seeks to place tighter restrictions on sponsored employment, known as the Skilled Worker visa route.

The Government will:

Introduce new requirements for workforce strategies for key sectors where there are high levels of recruitment from abroad.  Although there is no further information around these new requirements, it is likely that there will be steps each industry sector will need to take to demonstrate they have attempted to recruit from the UK’s resident labour market, and evidence the suitability of the overseas employee they wish to sponsor for work in the UK. Introduce a Labour Market Evidence Group to assess the state of the UK’s labour market.

Increase the threshold for Skilled Worker visas from RQF level 3 (school-leaver level) to RQF level 6 (graduate level) in an aim to curb lower-skilled migration.  This returns the skill level for work sponsorship to its pre-Brexit levels.

• Increase minimum salary thresholds – currently at £38,700pa or the higher of the relevant SOC Code. There is no indication that this may take into account regional or sector variations

Increase the Immigration Skills Charge for the first time since its introduction in 2017, by 32% in line with inflation.  Currently, employers who wish to sponsor a worker for employment in the UK must pay the Immigration Skills Charge at a rate of £1,000 per year of visa sponsorship if the employer is a medium or large-sized company, or at a rate of £364 per year if the employer is a small company or charitable organization.

Close “social care visas” – i.e. care worker visas – to new applicants. For a transitional period until 2028, extension applications in the UK will be permitted for migrants already in the country with working rights, but the Home Office will keep this under review.

• Introduce a new Temporary Shortage List (to replace the Immigration salary List introduced in April 2024, which replaced the Skills Shortage List), to ensure that only a narrow list of critical shortage occupations are capable of sponsorship and where workforce strategies to increase training and participation rates in the UK are in place.

• Restricting dependants for lower skilled workers on the Temporary Shortage List and increasing salary thresholds for all visa holders seeking to bring in dependants.

• Introduce measures to ensure that employers, using the immigration system, are incentivised to invest in boosting domestic talent, including options to restrict employers sponsoring skilled visas if they are not committed to increasing skills training. There is, at present, no  elaboration on how this will be assessed.

Family migration refers to visa routes for non-British or Irish family members of British nationals.  To apply for family visas, the applicant must demonstrate their relationship to the British citizen, demonstrate that they have sufficient funds to maintain themselves in the UK, have a beginner’s level of English, and that they genuinely intend to live in the UK as a family.  However, these applications can often be complex due to differing family circumstances, and the immigration rules permit the Home Office to exercise discretion where there are compelling and exceptional circumstances for this to ensure families can stay together.  The White Paper states that too many cases are treated as “exceptional” and a clear framework is required.

Before the end of this year, the Government will introduce a new family policy that will:

• cover all UK residents including those who are British, settled, on work routes or refugees, seeking to bring family members to the UK.
• have clear relationship requirements, designed to ensure only those in genuine, subsisting relationships qualify, and aimed at reducing forced marriage and include protections for victims of domestic abuse.
• ensure those coming to the UK have an appropriate level of English language skills, to be able to effectively integrate into local communities
• ensure the family unit has sufficient financial resources to support any migrants without relying on the taxpayer through reviewing and extending the financial requirements to other dependant routes, and
• ensure that those who serve or have served as members of HM Armed Forces and their dependants, have their rights to reside in the UK and become British citizens protected in line with this Government’s commitment to them, in the Armed Forces Covenant.