Restoring control over the immigration system: the government’s White Paper

It seems that over the past few months hardly a day goes by without press coverage of, or political commentary on, immigration matters in the UK. The public debate invariably starts from the premise that immigration in to the UK is a problem that needs addressing and addressing quickly: that net immigration into the UK is of such worrying proportions that action must be taken.

In May 2025, the government issued its White Paper ‘Restoring Control Over the Immigration System’. The title tells us everything: the narrative is that the UK has lost control of its borders. For many of us working in the immigration field this rhetoric is now very familiar but does not reflect our experience of immigration practice. The Immigration Rules are difficult for many people to meet and many applications are refused.

The detail

The foreword to the White Paper makes clear that the government sees immigration as a key political issue, with the Prime Minister asserting that the level of migration into the UK under the previous government has caused, “Incalculable damage to the economy and public services” and characterising the Conservative Party’s policies on immigration as a “one nation experiment in open borders”. Again, for those of us who have been working in the immigration field for many years, this description does not chime with the reality.

The White Paper is broad in scope and signals an intent to tighten up a broad range of lawful immigration routes in to the UK, including work, students, and family. Whilst being broad in its scope, the paper is devoid of specifics and, so, we will have to wait for the finer detail. However, it tells us enough to know that we should anticipate significant changes across the immigration Rules, policies, and legislation.

The drive for change is the assessment that net migration hit a record high of over 906,000 people in June 2023, a figure that has quadrupled from 224,000 in June 2019.

A particular concern to the government is the number of lower skilled workers who have come to work in the UK since the changes to the Rules in 2020, which relaxed the minimum skill level required from a graduate level job. The problem with the analysis in the White Paper is that these lower skilled workers are seen to be the reason, if not the cause, for the failure to increase skills levels across the UK resident workforce. It should be remembered that many of these lower skilled workers, whose presence in the UK is identified as problematic, have filled key roles in our health and social care systems, which would be running at huge vacancy levels without them. There is no mention that the changes in the skill levels were introduced in 2020: the year of lockdown and the pandemic. No doubt these workers would be surprised to learn that their contribution to the UK health and social care systems is the root of government failings to invest in training and skills for the UK resident workforce.

Most employers in the UK will not recognise the statement that the previous policy allowed them to ‘Freely recruit from abroad’. Workers do not have freedom of movement rights, must apply for entry clearance, and employers are required to have sponsorship licences and have ongoing duties to the Home Office to maintain that licence and the jobs must meet skill and salary thresholds.

Similarly, the government has turned its attention to the student route in to the UK identifying two areas of concern: an increase in sponsored study at lower ranked education institutions and an increase in students seeking asylum during the course of their studies. The White Paper acknowledges that between 2022 and 2023 international students contributed over £12 billion in tuition fees to higher education institutions across the UK, and also contributed to the UK’s world leading research sector. These are huge sums. And at a time when many UK higher institutions are struggling with funding, it is hard to understand why international students are no longer seen as a positive factor in supporting the UK higher education system as a whole. Yet this government, following the previous government’s hostility to overseas students, seems intent on reducing student numbers. At the same time, they are proposing to limit the opportunities for international students at UK institutions to work in the UK after their studies by reducing the amount of time a student can remain in the UK under the graduate visa route to 18 months. The Immigration Rules already set out onerous obligations on the education institutions, and the graduate visa in practice is more often than not a spring board to sponsored employment in the UK. The changes proposed seem to be in direct conflict with the government’s stated commitment to attracting the ‘brightest and the best’ to the UK.

In terms of family migration, the government’s starting position is that too many applications are being granted outside of the normal Immigration Rules to family members and that that undermines ‘control and confidence’. The White Paper acknowledges that many of those cases are granted after court rulings. This government has previously publicly questioned immigration court rulings in a way that drew a concerned response from The Lady Chief Justice. Whilst the government refers to court rulings undermining control or confidence in the immigration system, it is arguable that its questioning of the independence of the judiciary brings in to question its own commitment to the rule of law.

The government plans to introduce further reforms to the family route by the end of 2025, and yet the scant detail we have of the new family policy feels very familiar to the current Immigration Rules. For instance, the government states that the policy will have ‘clear relationship requirements designed to ensure only those in genuine subsisting relationships qualify and to reduce forced marriage and include protections for victims of domestic abuse’. Appendix FM and the linked caseworker guidance already does this. The Rules also require applicants to meet an English language and financial requirement.

Whilst much of the White Paper proposes a tightening of the Rules across the various routes into the UK, there is more here than that. The government wants to set out new policy through parliament as to where the balance can be struck between individual interests and the public interest in immigration control for those cases which fall outside of those Rules, ie, exceptional circumstance cases. This is in response to the government’s view that too many exceptional decisions are being made by the Home Office and the courts. Practitioners of longstanding will recognise in this a similarity to the language adopted in 2012 by the Conservative government, when Theresa May was Home Secretary, when they overhauled the family route and sought to set out how family life applications should be approached.

There is a lot in this White Paper that feels familiar and is more of the same.

The really significant change proposed is the increase from a 5-year to a 10-year qualifying period for indefinite leave to remain for those lawfully in the UK, with a knock-on similar increase for the length of residence in the UK before an application can be made to naturalise as British. It seems that the government may well seek to build on the recent changes to the good character guidance in regard to nationality matters, which seeks to bar refugees from becoming British if they arrived through unlawful routes. In addition, the White Paper refers to ‘earned settlement’: a nebulous concept that is apparently more than the applicant needing to meet eligibility and suitability requirements, which are already set out in the Rules. It is not clear why such an increase in qualifying residence requirements would benefit the UK or, indeed, how any of the new requirements or the rhetoric around them will assist the government in its intention to support businesses, the NHS, and care services, or to attract the brightest and the best to the UK.