UK visa applications for some nationalities could be restricted

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - LONDON — Visa applications from nationalities thought most likely to overstay and claim asylum in the UK could be restricted under a new government crackdown.

Under Home Office plans, first reported in the Times, people from countries such as Pakistan, Nigeria and Sri Lanka may find it more difficult to come to the UK to work and study.

Ministers believe there is a particular problem with those who come to the UK legally on work or study visas and then lodge a claim for asylum - which if granted, would allow them to stay in the country permanently.

A Home Office spokesperson said: "Our upcoming Immigration White Paper will set out a comprehensive plan to restore order to our broken immigration system."

It is not clear which nationalities are most likely to overstay their visas as the Home Office has not published statistics on exit checks for people on visas since 2020, due to a review into the accuracy of the figures.

Many exits from the UK can go unrecorded, meaning those without a departure record were not necessarily still in the country.

Prof Jonathan Portes, a senior fellow at the academic think tank UK in a Changing Europe, said the impact that restricting visas would have on the number of asylum applications was "likely to be quite small".

"I think the impact here is not designed primarily to be about numbers overall, it's designed to be about reducing asylum claims which are perceived to be abusive," he told BBC Radio 4's Today program.

"When you have someone who comes here ostensibly as a student and then switches quickly to the asylum route... that is an abuse of the system - the government is trying to reduce that."

Latest Home Office figures show that more than 108,000 people claimed asylum in the UK last year — the highest level since records began in 1979.

In total, 10,542 Pakistani nationals claimed asylum - the most of any nationality. Some 2,862 Sri Lankan nationals and 2,841 Nigerian nationals claimed asylum in the same period.

The latest figures for 2023/24 also show there were 732,285 international students in the UK, with most coming from India (107,480) and China (98,400).

The number of UK work and study visas dropped in 2024, compared to the year before.

Since becoming prime minister last year, Sir Keir Starmer has promised to reduce both illegal and legal migration - but has previously declined to offer a net migration target, saying an "arbitrary cap" has had no impact in the past.

Labour's plans to reduce migration include making it a criminal offense to endanger the lives of others at sea, to target small boat crossings, and cutting demand for overseas hires by developing training plans for sectors that are currently reliant on migrant workers.

Sir Keir has criticized the previous Conservative government, saying it failed to deliver lower net migration numbers "by design, not accident".

Net migration — the number of people coming to the UK, minus the number leaving - hit a record 906,000 in the year to June 2023, and then fell to 728,000 in the year to June 2024.

New rules introduced by former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in a bid to reduce migration levels appear to have contributed to the fall.

The previous Conservative government increased the minimum salary for skilled overseas workers wanting to come to the UK from £26,200 to £38,700 and banned care workers from bringing family dependants to the UK.

Labour was already under pressure to make changes to the immigration system - but that pressure may have grown after Reform UK's successes in last week's local elections.

Reform won 677 of around 1,600 seats contested on Thursday across a clutch of mainly Tory-held councils last contested in 2021.

In its general election manifesto, Reform said it would implement a freeze on non-essential immigration. Those with certain skills - for example in healthcare - would still be allowed to come to the UK.

Reacting to the results last week, Sir Keir said he shared the "sharp edge of fury" felt by voters leaning away from the major parties, arguing that it would spur him on to "go further and faster" in delivering Labour's promised changes to immigration and public services.

Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said that "some people on work or study visas may find their lives at risk because the political situation in their home country has changed", adding that it was right they were "protected from harm and given a fair hearing in the asylum system".

Plans to tackle overstaying were already being worked on before the local elections.

Full details of government's plans are due to be published in a new immigration white paper later in May.

A Home Office spokesperson said: "To tackle abuse by foreign nationals who arrive on work and study visas and go on to claim asylum, we are building intelligence on the profile of these individuals to identify them earlier and faster.

"We keep the visa system under constant review and will where we detect trends, which may undermine our immigration rules, we will not hesitate to take action.

"Under our plan for change, our upcoming Immigration White Paper will set out a comprehensive plan to restore order to our broken immigration system." — BBC