The Boriswave hasn’t even hit the shore

On 28 November 2024, Keir Starmer gave a speech where he lambasted the previous Conservative governments for running an “open borders experiment”, promising that his government would reduce immigration into Britain and that a white paper would be published in the months ahead, that would detail how control would be restored to Britain’s borders and immigration system.

Fast forward to 12 May 2025, and after numerous delays, the Government finally released the highly anticipated immigration white paper, titled, Restoring control over the immigration system.

The white paper includes several proposed measures to control immigration, including changes to the number of occupations eligible for the skilled worker visa, ending the recruitment of social care workers from overseas, a potential levy on international students and stricter English language requirements to come and settle in the UK, including for dependants of those on work visas.

One of the more significant proposals is increasing the qualifying period for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR), which is also known as settlement or permanent residence; from the current five years to ten years, with exceptions for those who are married to British citizens and those under the EU Settlement Scheme, both of which will retain the ability to apply for settlement after five years.

Immigration policy must prioritise the wishes of the British people and policies that benefit the country

The white paper also outlines an “earned settlement” scheme, whereby some migrants would be able to qualify for settlement sooner, if they hit certain criteria, which are unspecified and will be outlined in a consultation later this year.

The Government has not yet confirmed whether the proposed changes to settlement will be applied to migrants who are already in the UK on a visa.

The Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper, was asked this question by Conservative MP, Nick Timothy, in a video posted on his X (Twitter) account, to which Yvette Cooper replied stating the Government wants the settlement rules to apply as “swiftly as possible” and “apply widely”.

The implication here is that the changes to settlement will apply to those currently in the UK, but this wasn’t a direct answer to the question. 

The House of Commons Library notes that the technical annex document which was published alongside the white paper does suggest that the proposed changes will be applied to those already here, on paragraph 11 of the technical annex document it states the following: “a number of those currently in the UK are likely to leave due to it taking longer to gain settled status”.

The BBC and The Times have also published articles reporting that the changes to the qualifying period for settlement will apply to those who are already in the UK, as well as any new visa applicants in future.

The Financial Times has reported differently, stating that while Yvette Cooper intends for the policy to apply to migrants who are already in the UK, when contacted, the Home Office stated the policy would not apply retrospectively to those already here, citing that the courts would likely rule this illegal. 

The FT article, quoting a “source close to Yvette Cooper” said any application for settlement put in after the new rules are in force would face the new requirements, regardless of when they entered the UK.

Reading these reports, I suspect the Home Secretary wants to apply the changes retrospectively, but there might be others within the Home Office that don’t want this to apply to migrants who are already in the UK, hence the conflicting reports.

In 2006, Tony Blair’s Government set a precedent and increased the qualifying period for settlement (ILR) from four years to five years. This was outlined in a statement of change to parliament on 30 March 2006 (HC1016) and these changes took effect on 3 April 2006 and applied retrospectively to those already in the UK.

In 2008, the Government lost a court case over this retrospective element, specifically in relation to those who arrived under the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme (HSMP), who were contractually promised a route to settlement under a qualifying period of four years.

Since 2021, immigration into Britain has surged massively, which has been dubbed the Boriswave. This cohort will start to qualify for settlement (ILR) from 1 January 2026, under the current rules.

The Centre for Policy Studies think tank released a paper showing that between January 2021 and June 2024, over two-million visas were issued that could result in those visa holders obtaining ILR, with the central estimate that if the rules around settlement (ILR) aren’t changed, between January 2026 and June 2029, over 800,000 of these migrants will obtain ILR, with a projected lifetime cost exceeding £230 billion pounds.

This is because once ILR is obtained, migrants can access a raft of benefits, including: 

• The ability to live and work in the UK indefinitely, without paying any visa fees 
• The ability to apply for British citizenship after 12 months of having ILR status
• Access to a range of state benefits, including but not limited to; social housing, universal credit (UC), personal independence payments (PIP), disability benefits, child benefit, and entitlement to the NHS, without having to pay the immigration health surcharge (IHS)
• Access to a UK state pension, provided they have at least ten years of National Insurance (NI) contributions
• The right to bring family members from overseas to the UK, who can later qualify for ILR themselves and bring their family members over
• Any child born in the UK to someone with ILR status is automatically a British citizen, even if none of the parents are British citizens and the child was born before the parent(s) had ILR status

If the Government is serious about reducing immigration into Britain and that settlement in the UK is a privilege that is earned, not a right, then they must apply the proposed changes to settlement (ILR) retrospectively, including migrants who are already in the UK rather than just applying it to new arrivals.

Does the Government earnestly believe that defending such a decision in public and if necessary, in the courts, would incur a greater cost than the projected £230 billion? Gina Miller’s judicial review of the Government’s ability to invoke Article 50, which went all the way to the Supreme Court, cost the taxpayer £1.2 million, which pales in comparison.

Immigration policy must prioritise the wishes of the British people and policies that benefit the country socially, culturally and economically, rather than what benefits the world, immigrants or their families. If these changes aren’t applied retrospectively, then the white paper will not turn into a serious attempt at cutting and controlling immigration.