- The Graduate Route will be reduced from two years to 18 months
- Use of the Agent Quality Framework will become mandatory for any institution using recruitment agents to attract international students
- Compliance requirements for institutions sponsoring international students will be tightened
- New English language requirements for student dependants and skilled workers
The UK government’s immigration white paper has been released today, tightening every area of the UK’s immigration system, including study, work and family.
The UK’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer has promised that “enforcement will be tougher than ever and migration numbers will fall”.
The immigration white paper sets out changes to the UK Graduate Route, shortening the visa route from two years to a period of 18 months after graduation.
Despite speculation that the white paper would outline plans to tie the Graduate Route to professional roles only, the document does not specify that staying in the country after graduation will depend on securing specific jobs.
It says that the government is “setting out reforms… [that] strengthen the requirements to work and contribute for those graduates who stay on after their
courses have been completed”. However, exactly what these reforms will be remains to be seen.
The government will also be exploring the introduction of a levy on higher education provider income from international students, to be reinvested into the higher education and skills system. While no final decision has been made, the white paper models a potential 6% levy as an illustrative example. Further details will be set out in the Autumn budget later this year.
Also laid out in the white paper are measures to prevent the misuse of student visas. The government said it will strengthen the requirements that all sponsoring institutions must meet in order to recruit international students through changes to the the Basic Compliance Assessment (BCA) – an annual assessment used to
monitor each sponsor’s level of compliance.
The government said current thresholds are too lenient and “have left the route open to abuse and exploitation”. To address this, it will raise the minimum pass rates by five percentage points – for example, institutions will now need at least a 95% course enrolment rate and a 90% course completion rate to stay compliant.
A new “Red-Amber-Green” rating system will also be introduced to make it clearer which institutions are meeting standards and which are falling short. Those at risk of failing will face targeted interventions, including limits on how many international students they can enroll and being placed on tailored improvement plans.
The Agent Quality Framework (AQF) will also be made mandatory for institutions wishing to use recruitment agents for international students.
Elsewhere, new English language requirements are set to be introduced across a broad range of visa routes.
While prospective international students are usually required to meet a certain level of English to enrol on a program in the UK, until now there has been no need for their adult dependants to prove their language proficiency.
Under the plans, dependants will have to show they have a basic grasp of English (at an A1 level) to enter the country, showing progression to A2 level over time for any visa extension and B2 (independent user) to secure settled status.
English language requirements will also be raised for skilled workers, and workers where a language requirement already applies, from B1 to B2, in accordance with the Common European Framework.
“When people come to our country, they should also commit to integration and to learning our language and our system should actively distinguish between those that do and those that don’t,” said Starmer.
The white paper also outlines plans to tighten regulation of the short-term study route for English language learners, with a particular focus on the bodies that accredit language schools.
The Short-Term Student (English Language) route allows individuals aged 16 and over to study English in the UK for six to 11 months at an accredited institution, and does not require sponsorship.
The government will launch a review of these accreditation organisations to ensure their processes are robust, both at the point of approving new institutions and during renewal. The report suggests that stronger oversight is needed to prevent abuse of the route, which has seen high visa refusal rates in recent years.
The white paper comes as the UK government attempts to bring down net migration.
“Lower net migration, higher skills and backing British workers – that is what this white paper will deliver,” said Starmer.
In the year ending June 2023, nearly 1 million people came to the UK. For the year ending June 2024, there was an estimated net migration to the UK of 728,000, marking a 20% drop from the previous 906,000, partly down to the government’s ban on dependants for students on UK postgraduate-taught courses.
Lower net migration, higher skills and backing British workers – that is what this white paper will deliver
Keir Starmer, UK Prime Minister
Elsewhere, new measures laid out in the white paper mean skills thresholds for work visas will be returned to degree level, with the government reversing a system that saw the proportion of lower-skilled visas issued vastly increase between 2021 and 2024.
The skilled visa threshold will be raised to RQF6 (graduate level) in a bid to reduce increasing numbers of lower-skilled workers coming to the UK, the government set out, with salary thresholds reflecting the higher skill level.
For occupations below this level, access to the immigration system will be strictly time-limited, according to the government, granted only on the basis of “strong evidence of shortages which are critical to the industrial strategy and where workforce strategies are drawn up so employers also commit to increasing domestic skills and recruitment”.
The government’s new system will also end automatic settlement and citizenship for anyone living in the UK for five years.
Instead, migrants must spend a decade in the UK before applying to stay “unless they can show a real and lasting contribution to the economy and society”.
Under a new framework to be rolled out “high-skilled, high-contributing individuals who play by the rules and contribute to the economy and society” would be fast-tracked, with the government citing nurses, doctors, engineers and AI leaders as examples.
