UK to slash foreign workers, student intakes to cut record immigration

London: Britain has vowed to slash its annual migrant intake in half by making it harder for employers to hire overseas staff, axing spousal visas and foreign student intakes amid a growing backlash to record high immigration numbers.

Home Secretary James Cleverly announced a five-point plan to curb immigration on Tuesday (AEDT) in an attempt to cut it by 300,000 people a year. That would almost halve current net migration levels, which hit 672,000 in the year to June, according to official data. Net migration is the difference in the number of people entering and leaving the country.

A passenger at Heathrow Airport in London. The UK government wants to slash immigration levels.Credit: Bloomberg

The plan comes after official figures last month showed net migration had risen to a record 745,000 last year. MPs from the ruling Conservative Party have since piled pressure on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and his government to bring it down.

According to the plan designed to give Sunak a grip on the politically charged issue ahead of an election year, people seeking to obtain a visa to work in the UK would need a job that pays at least £38,700 ($73,837) annually, up from £26,200, while care workers would be barred from bringing their families into the country.

British citizens and residents who want to bring their foreign spouse to Britain will have to earn the same amount – almost double the current threshold. Some fields with a shortage of workers, such as health and social care, would be exempt from the higher threshold.

A YouGov poll last week found that 41 per cent of voters said immigration was one of the three biggest issues facing the country, up from 14 per cent in 2020. Only the economy and the National Health Service (NHS) are seen as more pressing problems.

British Home Secretary James Cleverly. Credit: Bloomberg

The sharp increase represents a huge political challenge for the Conservatives, whose successive governments have repeatedly promised to reduce net migration since winning power in 2010, and vowed to “take back control” of the country’s borders since the Brexit vote.

In another heavy blow to government policies on irregular migration, the Supreme Court last month blocked Sunak’s flagship policy of sending “small-boat migrants” to Rwanda for processing.

“Enough is enough,” Cleverly said. “Immigration policy must be fair, legal, and sustainable.”

But employer groups lashed out, saying the package could raise costs and exacerbate labour shortages, adding it “sends a really bad signal around the world”, while unions attacked the curbs on family members.

Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on board a Border Agency vessel during a visit to Dover, England, in June as part of his “Stop the boats” campaign.Credit: AP

Christina McAnea, general secretary of the Unison trade union, told Reuters that the measures would be a “total disaster” for health and care sectors.

“Migrant workers were encouraged to come here because both sectors are critically short of staff. Hospitals and care homes simply couldn’t function without them,” she said. “Migrants will now head to more welcoming countries, rather than be forced to live without their families.”

Former prime minister David Cameron, before he came to power, pledged to bring net migration below 100,000, while at the 2019 election Boris Johnson promised to cut overall numbers. In the year to June 2019, official figures showed net migration at 224,000. The figure in 2022 was more than three times that.

The new salary level of £38,700 is roughly equivalent to the UK’s median wage and is unlikely to have a big impact on overseas hiring in sectors such as finance and management consultancy, which have traditionally relied on skilled worker visas.

Foreign health and care workers would be banned from bringing their children, spouses and partners — collectively known as dependants — with them to the UK from next April.

In the year ending in September, some 101,000 visas were issued to care workers and an estimated 120,000 visas were granted to their family dependants, the government said.

The Home Office believes the previously announced ban on most overseas students bringing dependants with them would account for almost half of the overall reduction target.

Cleverly said he had also asked the Migration Advisory Committee to review the graduate immigration route, which allows students to remain in the UK for two years after graduation, or three years if they have completed a doctorate, “to reduce opportunities for abuse”.

The measures come in addition to restrictions announced earlier this year that will prevent foreign students bringing in dependants, unless they are undertaking a research-led postgraduate course.

Cleverly said the changes would result in the “biggest ever reduction in net migration” and were possible because of separate measures to boost the domestic labour force and help to get an estimated five million economically inactive British people into work.

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