How new UK immigration rules could tear families apart

New immigration rules that prevent Britons earning less than £38,700 from living with their foreign spouses have been branded ‘draconian’, ‘discriminatory’ and ‘anti-family’ by campaigners and lawyers.

Changes to the minimum income for family visas, announced by Home Secretary James Cleverly, mean that people may not be able to bring their loved ones into the country in certain circumstances.

Cleverly put, British citizens must earn at least £38,700 to sponsor foreign relatives who want to get a visa.

Figures from HM Revenue and Customs show that from 2020/21 the 73rd percentile of the UK population earned less than this month, effectively meaning just under three-quarters of Brits could be excluded under the new proposals.

The current minimum income to sponsor a spouse or partner is £18,600 – more than half the newly proposed amount – raising concerns that more families could be torn apart by the latest reform become.

The policy, expected to be introduced next spring, has been set out by Cleverly as part of a package of proposals aimed at delivering the biggest ever reduction in net migration after levels soared to a record high.

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The ONS has revised its net migration figure to a record 745,000 for 2022.

Slim said his new strategy, along with previously announced plans to restrict the entry of relatives of foreign students into the country, would reduce the number by 300,000.

Immigration lawyers have said that changing minimum income levels for family visas will not substantially reduce numbers and that the pain of stopping people from living with the person they love is not worth the benefits.

“Bottom line, don’t fall in love with someone from a foreign country,” immigration attorney Katie Newbury told Yahoo News.

The lawyer from law firm Kingsley Napley, which specializes in immigration issues, said she was “genuinely shocked” by Cleverly’s announcement, and would not be surprised if it faced a legal challenge.

She said that before a minimum income threshold of £18,600 was first introduced in 2012, people only had to show they could earn a living without having to rely on public funds.

Now Newbury says the foreign spouse of a British citizen could earn a significant amount of money, but this would not count towards the £38,700 minimum if he or she came to the country for the first time.

A foreign partner could only count their income towards the claim if they earned money in Britain, which is unlikely to be the case if they haven’t even arrived in the country yet.

If you rely on income from work or self-employment, it must be on behalf of the British or the established partner, Newbury said, although their money can be earned in Britain or abroad depending on the type of income.

Newbury added that applicants will need to earn an additional amount for each of their non-British children, meaning the threshold could be even higher for many families.

Although foreign spouses cannot rely on their income from abroad as it may not be available to them in Britain, they can rely on savings and investments under current rules.

Downing Street has since confirmed that the minimum income of £38,700 applied to a “household as a whole”.

Even the current lower minimum income has taken its toll, with a 2015 report from the Children’s Commissioner claiming that 15,000 children were living in so-called ‘Skype families’ because both their parents could not live together.

With the average gross annual income for full-time workers in Britain at £34,963 in April 2023, according to the ONS, Newbury says “significantly more” families will be torn apart under the new proposal.

“I have clients who have money, but who don’t comply with the rules in some way. You may have people who live with family for free, they have no accommodation costs, but that doesn’t matter.

“When they came up with that figure of £18,600 in 2012, there was a lot of discussion about what they thought was the minimum to stop people having to rely on public funds. This last figure seems to have been pulled out of nowhere.

“We’re not talking about huge numbers, so if you’re worried about reducing net migration, it won’t do anything. We are not talking about hundreds of thousands of people coming in as spouses of British citizens.”

‘Draconian, discriminatory and serves no real purpose’

Jonathan Portes, a professor of economics at King’s College University who specializes in immigration and labor mobility, told Yahoo News that the family visa proposal is “very draconian by international standards.”

He added that, given the distribution of income in Britain, the policy would be “discriminatory based on gender, ethnicity and based on where you live in the country”.

“It is very important to say that this is a rule that applies to British people getting married, it is not just immigrants who are affected,” he added.

Some critics have argued that the Home Office’s choice of words, referring to transferring ‘next of kin’ to Britain, attempts to get away from the fact that British nationals will be prevented from transferring their partners.

Portes added: “I think this is a clearly socially unjust and draconian rule that serves no real purpose.

‘It’s not like there’s a huge wave of public concern about people marrying people on £25,000 a year incomes and marrying foreigners.

‘I don’t think the British public are concerned about them in terms of immigration and the numbers in those cases are not that great.

“It’s hard not to see exactly the kind of xenophobic gesture towards parts of the Tory right without specific social or economic grounds, but that’s my personal view.”

With the new £38,700 requirement, immigration lawyer Colin Yeo said around “3/4 of employees” would be ineligible to sponsor a partner.

“They will either have to split up and live in different countries or move abroad together,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

“The impact on affected children is great. Women, part-time workers, ethnic minorities and anyone outside London will be disproportionately affected. British citizens returning from abroad will also be badly affected.”

Meanwhile, Ben Ansell, professor of comparative democratic institutions at Nuffield College, Oxford University, wrote: ‘It is deeply unconservative to say that only people earning above the 73rd percentile of the income distribution can live with who they love. policy.”

The Prime Minister’s spokesperson said on Tuesday: “The family immigration rules include a provision for exceptional circumstances where there would be unjustifiably harsh consequences for the applicant, their partner, a relevant child or other family member if their application were refused.”

No examples of such circumstances were given and the spokesperson said applications would be assessed “on a case-by-case basis”.