Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has partially revised plans to lengthen the time foreign workers must wait for settlement in the UK. She abandoned a proposed 15-year qualifying period for workers in occupations below graduate level, but retained plans to double the standard period from five years to 10 for most workers.
The Guardian editorial argues that the changes still unfairly make pay a factor in determining when migrants can establish secure roots. Home Office figures cited by the editorial indicate that someone earning £41,700 makes a similar lifetime fiscal contribution to a person earning £50,271, despite facing a settlement wait that is five years longer. Workers earning about £125,000, meanwhile, could qualify after three years.
The revised approach affects care workers recruited after the pandemic to address workforce shortages. People who arrived between 2022 and 2025, meet the conditions of their care worker visas and earn at least £25,000 will still be able to apply for indefinite leave to remain after five years. The Home Office estimates that this could include up to 146,000 care workers and 136,000 dependants.
Those who do not meet the requirements would need to obtain another five-year health and social care visa before applying for indefinite leave to remain. The editorial highlights concerns about exploitation in the care sector, where some employers have allegedly taken advantage of migrant workers’ vulnerable visa status, and questions how the government will identify cases in which wages have been deliberately kept low.
The proposals would also distinguish between asylum seekers according to how they reached the UK. People admitted through “safe and legal” routes could settle after five years, while those who entered irregularly by small boat could face waits of up to 30 years, even after their protection claims have been recognised. The editorial questions the fairness of penalising people for failing to use routes that, according to the UN, refugees cannot directly access for UK resettlement.
Mahmood’s wider approach would make settlement depend not only on residence but also on tax paid, English-language ability and applicants’ character. The prime minister has given the policy his full support, according to the editorial, which says the plans risk creating a guest-worker system in which migrants fill lower-paid labour shortages while their long-term membership of society remains conditional.
Sources: The Guardian Politics.