Proposed ILR Rules – The Unfair Impact on Working Mothers and the Need for a Full Maternity Exemption

[Zinary]

I am writing this with a newborn in my arms, and my heart is completely breaking.
Instead of being allowed to heal, rest, and soak in the pure joy of my baby, I am sitting here crying, terrified, and questioning if I made the right choice to have a child. How can a mother be driven to question her greatest gift, her absolute world, all because of a cruel change to immigration law?
On 2 November, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced the finalized "Earned Settlement" rules. To get Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) in the standard 5 years, you now must earn over £50,271 a year.
But the absolute malice is in the fine print: you must meet that £50,271 threshold in three out of the last five years before you apply.
The Home Office is actively spinning this "3 out of 5 years" rule as a generous maternity "buffer." They are telling the public it gives women two years of leeway to have a baby.
Let me tell you why that math is a blatant, calculated lie for real women:

1. The Starting Trap: Many of us spent our first two years in the UK working up from entry-level salaries, earning below that £50k mark. Our two "buffer years" are ALREADY GONE. We have zero margin for error left.
2. The Maternity Penalty: Pregnancy is nine months of physical toll, followed by maternity leave and statutory pay dips. If your annual P60 earnings drop below £50,271 because you lose out on bonuses, commission, or overtime while caring for your baby, your year doesn't count. The clock resets.
3. The Multi-Child Ban: If you want to have two children within five years, it is mathematically impossible to hit that threshold for three consecutive years.

If the math fails you because you chose to have a baby, you are forced onto the 10-year path. The punishment? Paying thousands of pounds more in upfront Immigration Health Surcharges (IHS) and visa extensions just to keep your home. For a family, we are talking about an extra £35,000+ extracted by the Home Office. This is evil. It is a pay-to-settle hierarchy that penalizes the female body and treats human lives like a spreadsheet. The right to live and build a family must NEVER be a hard choice. The Home Office is laying these rules before Parliament next month (December) to take effect in 2027. We have a tiny, critical window to fight this. I am calling on every mother, every ally, and anyone who believes that a woman shouldn't be penalized for having a child to help us.

• If you are an immigration lawyer: How do we launch a class-action challenge against this under the Equality Act?
• If you have links to journalists or MPs: Please help us get this cruel math into the mainstream media. Backbench Labour MPs forced a U-turn on care workers last week—we can force a U-turn on mothers if we make enough noise.
• If you are a British citizen: Will you write to your MP on behalf of your migrant friends and colleagues who have no voice in the ballot box?

Please bump this, share this, and tell me what we can do. I refuse to let a spreadsheet dictate whether it was a "mistake" to hold my beautiful baby.

Some people are just being silly now. The UK is absolutely not the only liberal democracy with (mostly) freedom of speech, which is what is required to allow the people who live there, immigrants or otherwise, to freely criticise the government or other institutions.

Ergo the UK is certainly not the only country that tolerates public criticism from immigrants. There are certainly countries where you couldn't get away with public dissent but these are not countries I would aspire to copy and it certainly doesn't align with British values as I understand them.

I don't agree that a full maternity exemption would be a good idea, though I think other ideas are sensible, like allowing citizenship applications as soon as you meet requirements rather than going to a 10 year track if you miss the 5 year track. To be honest I didn't realise that was the case and it does seem stupid. But regardless what I think, OP and other immigrants are absolutely allowed to say what they think about government policy and the UK really would be a shithole if they couldn't.

👏👏

Im guessing based on the fact to get here they pass through other safe European countries. So probably after an easy life not necessarily in fear for their lives

They can indeed disagree with government policy, however they are bound by it and they don’t get to influence it until they get the right to vote.

I don’t think asking people to contact their MP is going to get the support the OP expected.

I didn't say otherwise. I'm talking about the posters who think it's a disgrace and a joke that immigrants are 'allowed' to say bad things about the UK and that the UK is the only country that would tolerate such behaviour.

It's actually a good thing that immigrants have freedom of speech and can voice their opinions, as they can in lots of other countries besides the UK.

No one’s saying they shouldn’t have free speech, it just seems astoundingly odd to move to another country and then shit all over it and moan about how awful it is to such a degree.
For all America’s faults they do seem to have a much bigger buy in from immigrants, who move there and want to be part of the country and feel grateful to have made the choice they did.
Conversely the UK does seem to attract immigrants who want to moan about so many core elements of the country, it does beg the question ‘why are you here?’ to most people.

What was your career that gave you healthcare at the start of it, and when you were on 22k

I'm on over 80k, private sector, and I do not have healthcare

I would see myself as more than averagely progressive/ “left wing” but I’m afraid your arguments don’t convince me that this is particularly unfair. Not from the maternity angle anyway (I might be convinced that it shouldn’t be so high a threshold in the first place).

I agree with others than there’s nothing wrong with suggesting people can wait an extra couple of years before having a baby.

Well some people said the country shouldn't 'tolerate' it. I don't know what 'not tolerating' criticism would look like on a national level but it certainly sounds like that would have to involve some kind of sanction, which would be a restriction on freedom of speech.

Does the UK really need people coming here who openly state they “hate it”?

This. My son married an American lass 15 years ago, and emigrated over there. After all these years, of working and paying taxes, he still cannot get any public funding help. He has to pay for heath care and everything else.

I think people need to drop their expectations around what we should be doing for non Brits. . 🙄

Who have said they hate it? Not me if you are referriing to my posts. I don’t particularly like it either. I would not choose to live here was it not for my DH. I was saying living standards is much better in my home country, but people are losing their shit and taking my post which was said in context completely out of proportion. I didn’t start a thread titled “Britain stinks” 😆

So what should actually happen to an immigrant who says publicly that they hate the UK? Deport them, is that it?

I think freedom of speech is a core British value and wouldn't want to see it eroded in that way. Sounds like something thay would happen in places people can't speak out like Russia or Iran.

If you just mean that you personally wouldn't want to be friends with them then yeah whatever, that's your prerogative.

I know plenty of immigrants here in Iceland who have a lot of bad things to say about Icelandic politics and various aspects of Icelandic society but we also have freedom of speech which I think is great 👍 I just feel sorry for anyone if they feel themselves to be stuck somewhere that they feel miserable in. Lots of people get stuck for family reasons, I just think it's sad.

Speech IS restricted by laws for all of us - there are consequences for what we say.

Criticism of the country is fine. However if you disagree with the laws of your chosen country to the point of asking residents to contact their MP then you have to decide whether this country is right for you.

You can dislike the country in which you live - that’s fine. You can say what you like within the limits of ‘free speech’.

However if you are a non resident without ILR who is expressing contempt or hate, then it makes you look a bit ridiculous because you have chosen to come here, chosen to stay and, in many/most cases, are taking advantage of the free-at-point-of-contact services.

So all you mean by not tolerating it is that you don't like it and you don't like these people, but no kind of sanction should actually be imposed and the person can continue to make their own decisions about what they say and do and where they live? So the country, as in the state, should in fact tolerate it? Then we agree on the fundamentals.

That’s actually also part of living in a democracy. We are able to write to our MP and also asking people to write to their MP. I just sighed a petition to remove a box junction camera I don’t like. There might be lots of immigrants having signed this petition. How do you feel about that?

Yes, I think the UK often attracts immigrants who despise it, often for its weakness in asserting its culture and protecting its borders.

It has become normalised in many instititions anx organisations to slag this country off and I think immigrants often pick up on that and join in, not realising that not everybody thinks that way.

The UK is actually very good at protecting its borders contrary to Daily Fail rhetoric. The UK is for example not a member of Schengen. Sensible in my view.

Yes it's crazy and insulting. If I chose to go and live in a country I wouldn't dream of slagging the place off. Just basic bad manners.

But the real point is will Mahmood toughen up the immigration process or will she cave in to the left wing of the Labour Party? I'd be very surprised if Mahmood actually makes any significant changes to restrict the numbers.

If they have ILR then I couldn’t care less. Why are you determined to make people look like they just randomly hate immigrants?

I don’t think anyone on here has an issue with people who are immigrants. If they have residence then they are part of the democratic process.

The issue is with people like the OP - presumably she chose to move here (and applies to any other country), then chose to have a baby before she was given ILR which will affect her claim for ILR.

Having made those choices she then complains about how unfair the rules are because she considers it inhumane that her claim is adversely affected by her choices.

Not sure who you are addressing but why move here then whinge about it?

Well the British did a lot more than just whinging in countries not their own in the not too distant past as I recall 😛

“Oath of allegiance
I, (name), swear by Almighty God that, on becoming a British citizen, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles III, his Heirs and Successors, according to law.
Affirmation of allegiance
I (name) do solemnly, sincerely and truly declare and affirm that on becoming a British Citizen, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles III, his Heirs and Successors, according to law.
Pledge
I will give my loyalty to the United Kingdom and respect its rights and freedoms. I will uphold its democratic values. I will observe its laws faithfully and fulfil my duties and obligations as a British citizen.”

To become a citizen after ILR you have to swear the above.
I choose to believe that most people swearing that will do it in good faith.

Why not? Nowhere's a utopia, nobody likes everything about where they live whether they've chosen it actively or just been born there. Most people appreciate some things and have a moan about some other things. As I say I just feel sorry for people who are miserable with their situation.

But I was only addressing the people on the thread who I believed had become rather silly by saying that criticism from immigrants shouldn't be tolerated by the country. Countries that don't tolerate criticism are shitholes.