New immigration rule to ban foreign students from bringing family to UK: Announcement this week

LONDON May 22: The UK government is set to ban most international students from bringing their family to the UK in a crackdown against immigration. According to reports in The Sun, all foreign university students on courses below a PhD are set to be barred from bringing family members to the UK.

The ban will not apply to PhD students, whose courses usually last between 3 and 5 years and are very highly skilled.

This crackdown is expected to be announced on Tuesday or Wednesday.

In exclusive interviews to The Telegraph some students have revealed on how they use student visa scheme to bring their less well-educated spouses to the UK as a backdoor route to work. They are helped by agents in India who advertise how they can secure dependant visas for their spouses within days without them even requiring an English language test certificate.

In a major development Prof Brian Bell, the chairman of the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) has too backed plans to crack down on foreign graduate visas.

In a Telegraph interview, Prof Bell, a professor of economics at King’s Business School at King’s College London, said the graduate visa had allowed foreign students “pretty much unrestricted rights to work” for two years for the price of a one-year masters degree.

Masters students can bring in spouses and children, then stay with them on a graduate visa.

Prof Bell said the MAC had found the students who stayed after graduating were often in low-skilled, low-earning jobs of little benefit to the economy.

“An offer to do anything you want for two years seems unnecessary to us, so personally I’ve never been massively in favour of the graduate route,” he said.

Prof Bell said fewer overseas students would mean a reduction in GDP. However, a large number of dependants could increase the burden on taxpayers, he said – for example, through school costs.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman reportedly also wanted to increase the salary threshold for those workers coming to the UK. Currently foreign workers have to earn at least £26,000 to move here, but she wanted this upped to £33,000 – the average wage in Britain. The proposal, also backed by Robert Jenrick, was overruled by the Treasury.

Prof Bell said fewer overseas students would mean a reduction in GDP. However, a large number of dependants could increase the burden on taxpayers, he said – for example, through school costs.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak pledged to reduce net migration when he entered Downing Street last year – but he’s likely to come out fighting on these figures.

He inherited them as they date back to to the year ending December 2022, two months after he became prime minister, The Sun reports.

The number of people coming to the UK using a relative’s student visa reached 135,788 last year, which is nine times more than in 2019.