The UK has overhauled its immigration rules, doubling the time most foreign workers must wait to qualify for permanent residency to 10 years and making refugees arriving by “small boats” wait up to 30 years. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood, speaking in Parliament on Monday, said hundreds of thousands of care workers will be exempt from the hardline rules, offering a concession amid a political outcry within the ruling Labor Party. Known in the UK as indefinite leave to remain, it carries the right to work, study, use the free National Health Service and claim social benefits. So far, it has been granted after five years. The new rules, which go into effect next year, tie eligibility for permanent residence to income. People earning more than £50,000 a year ($67,000) will still be able to apply after five years, and those earning more than £125,000 ($167,500) after three. All others will be placed on the 10-year path. The average salary in the United Kingdom is about 39,000 pounds (approximately $52,000). The rules will apply retroactively to workers already in the country. “Settlement should not be automatic. It must be earned,” Mahmood, the home secretary, told parliament, adding that the changes would restore fairness by linking the right to settle with what migrants bring. “Those who contribute the most will settle faster,” he said. “Those who do not follow the rules will be turned away or will wait longer.” Care workers, refugeesThe UK government first proposed last year that lower-skilled workers wait 10 to 15 years for permanent residency. But the plan has drawn fierce opposition from unions and parts of the Labor Party, particularly over its effect on care workers, who are often poorly paid and work in a sector that has long struggled to fill vacancies. Many of them arrived in the early 2020s, as the country reeled from the COVID-19 pandemic, to fill gaps left by European workers who had left after Brexit. Under the revised plan, care workers will be able to settle after five years if they have met the conditions of their visas and earn at least 25,000 pounds ($33,500) a year. Mahmood said the rules would offer a pathway for care workers “who worked hard and responded to our call when we needed them”. As for refugees, those who arrive through one of the government’s “new legal and safe routes” will be able to settle after five years, he said. For other refugees, the standard wait will become 20 years, reduced to 10 years for those working or studying. Anyone arriving by an “illegal method,” such as by small boat, could wait up to 30 years to reach a settlement, he said. Under the new rules, applicants will also be disqualified if they have a criminal record, cannot speak English “to a high level”, owe money to the government or have not made at least three years of national insurance contributions. Mahmood said the reform would mean half a million people would settle later than they would have otherwise, saving the government billions of pounds in benefits. In total, the government estimates that up to 1.4 million people will receive settled status between 2026 and 2030. The changes, announced after a 12-week public consultation that garnered more than 200,000 responses, are part of a wider effort to tighten immigration rules after arrivals surged following Brexit. They are a response to political pressure, including from Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party, which has gained popularity in recent years with calls for stricter immigration controls. Reform UK has tried to portray refugee arrivals on small boats across the English Channel as a crisis, and anti-immigration campaigners have organized protests, including outside facilities housing asylum seekers. Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s government has said greater police cooperation between the UK and France has helped reduce the number of people crossing so far this year by more than 40 per cent compared to 2025.
