Changes to immigration rules announced by Starmer

[OneAmberFinch]

Full white paper here is extensive and announces changes to all avenues of migration - basically their approach to resolving the issues of massively increased migration from 2019-2023/4.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6821aec3f16c0654b19060ac/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-white-paper.pdf

And Starmer's commentary on the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/ce810e3z6dkt

Handful of headline changes: default timeline to get ILR to go to 10 years instead of 5; abolishing new care worker visas; raising skills threshold for Skilled Workers back up to graduate level; increasing minimum grades required for student visas; various bits and pieces around English language requirements among several other policies

It always becomes the point under discussion when it is about immigration.

Interestingly, one day after the program was aired the Gendamerie closed the camp that was shown.

So it seems GN news are doing more to stop migrants than the French !

@OneAmberFinch Sorry, I’ll freely admit I haven’t read all 550+ posts to gain a nuanced view of your position. But if you don’t think Settled Immigrants should be turfed out, it may not be the wisest move to suggest the only reason why it shouldn’t happen is because it’s illegal. The fact that it would strip the British economy of highly valuable, contributing workers and community members is the actual reason why that shouldn’t happen, and we need to keep repeating that until the half-asleep people who think legal immigrants are here to live off crappy British benefits is put firmly to bed.

As is apparent on this thread, one size of immigration does not fit all.

I might start another thread when there is more clarity. Right now, the island of strangers is swathed in deep fog.

Continue to blame asylum seekers if that makes you feel better It's easy.

Well it must be someone's fault?

Who are you going to blame?

Wonko the Wonder Dog?

The Tories?

I'm surprised no-one has tried to blame the Jews (satire)

I never understood the dislike of the asylum seekers. It seems to me that when you take an active part in wars in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan etc etc, and had a Prime Minister who took credit for dissuading Zelensky from accepting a peace deal etc etc, then you have to expect movement of peoplea from those warzones. And in conscience you have a moral duty to do something.

Anyway, soon won't be my circus or my monkeys anymore.

@GlutesthatSalute And in conscience you have a moral duty to do something.

That's pants.

Why am I responsible for decisions taken by politicians that I did not agree to?

I campaigned against the war in Irag, wrote letters to my MP etc etc all to no avail but Tony Blair wanted to be Bush's 'poodle' so away we went.

I am sorry that your life is coming to an end, I guess immigration must feel small compared to that.

I'm not dying lol

Oh jolly good!

You do realise that any country worth living in are battling the same immigration issues as us! So if you aren’t going to the pearly gates, unless you are heating to the arse end of nowhere this will be a serious issue wherever you go.

That's a common theme I hear from colleagues. "You get that everywhere." It's simply not true. Every country I have lived and worked in (four in total) has its own problems. But there is not a criminal service delivering tens of thousands of desperate migrants annually to my country by small boat, for example . They would not be housed and given the amenities they are given here in any case. My country has an annual refugee quota of 1000-1500 which it is estimated our country can absorb without putting stress on our services, and (rightly or wrongly) few refugee claims are accepted over and above this number.

We do not have anything remotely like your immigration issues, though we have, for example, a high cost of living and complex legal and social issues related to indigenous rights that you are free from.

I'm here on a Skilled Worker visa and I have a City job that pays nearly £200k a year, and I'm not on benefits (although I do use roads, NHS etc). I'm close to getting ILR according to the current/old rules. So I'm acutely aware of what's at play

I also keep an ear to the ground re: immigration rumblings and I've been expecting something like this announcement since I first heard the term "Boriswave" a couple of years ago. Based on the same rumblings, I think it's not out of the question that even if/once I get settled status there will be further jumps to get citizenship, that settled status may become subject to more checks, that settled status may not entitle people to benefits as it does today, etc. And I'm planning for any/all of those eventualities.

To the extent that I wish to influence policy (if Keir Starmer's team is reading random Mumsnet threads), I'd like there to be more tiers based on some combination of earnings, origin country, job sector etc, so that overall the immigration system favours profiles of people who are likely to both contribute financially and integrate well culturally, and gives those people more favourable terms including faster settlement and citizenship.

It’s interesting you can have a quota. Where is this? Can you say

Totally Agree, you seem like the perfect migrant. I hope you stay.

Thank you

It's such short term thinking and dodgy accounting to say we need immigration.

As pp have said, when you include lifetime cost and dependents it's significantly more expensive to use 'cheap' immigrant labour than to actually invest in our existing people and pay more.

I have several family members who have worked in elder care. They found it worthwhile and personally satisfying, but the pay is terrible. If it paid better and there were opportunities for training (qualification leading to a pay uplift) in the many specialised care needs elderly people have, I think it could become a good career path

Not saying specific areas don't have problems at all but i do seem to recall that our GP, Dental, AE services were dire long before x channel immigration?

My area has no migrant hotels & very little migrants, yet a lad knocked off his bike and suffering from a serious head injury, later taken to a specialist brain injury unit, waited 30 mins for an Ambulance, despite being in a city, i witnessed this, it was shocking.

NHS dental services non existent too.

Nothing to do with migrants, all to do with Austerity and under investment.

@jasflowers Not saying specific areas don't have problems at all but i do seem to recall that our GP, Dental, AE services were dire long before x channel immigration?

Not here they weren't (NW) and they still aren't.

The difference is that we don't have hotels full of migrants causing problems.

Nothing to do with migrants, all to do with Austerity and under investment.

Maybe if we weren't putting migrants up in 3/4 * hotels at a cost of £3million a day we might have some money to invest in our NHS?
On top of that, local communities are getting disrupted because weddings (and other functions) have been cancelled because the Home Office has commandeered the hotels to be used for migrants

We should be putting migrants up in tents like they do in France and then see how they won't be so keen to come here.

Public services have been in severe decline for at least a decade, thats a simple fact.
3m per day would make little difference to the demands that our older population put on the NHS/GPs.
Less than a 1% increase in total NHS spend, welcome of course but not the game changer you suggest.

On tents, some people come here knowing that once here, they are often here for good, even if refused asylum, they tend not to have passports, so even if they wanted to leave, they cannot!

How would you keep them in these tents? fences? guards? and what about security within these tent cities? happy to have a tent city and all that implies with sewage, water and cooking facilities, in your area? or just other peoples areas?
France doesn't even house most migrants in tents in any case.

Just another poorly thought out idea.

To deter economic migrants, there needs to be deportations & the fear of them but to where? this is the issue that has dogged the Tories and now Labour, as it would Reform.

@jasflowers To deter economic migrants, there needs to be deportations & the fear of them but to where? this is the issue that has dogged the Tories and now Labour, as it would Reform.

Agreed, but don't forget that Starmer cancelled Rwanda.

As for tents well, Eastern European workers were happy to live in tents and caravans when they came over here cauli-cutting in Lincolnshire pre-Brexit.
It would be quite easy to have a secure compound with razor-wire to keep them in,
France doesn't even house most migrants in tents in any case.

They are housed cheek-by-jowl in warehouses or informal camps by the roadsides and in woods near Calais

We need to get tough and stop pandering to these ungrateful people who are taking us for fools
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-66994944

The way to make the UK less attractive is to stop people from illegally disappearing into the black economy. Cutting out black economy tax evasion by the native population is also necessary.

I've had the same experience as a pp, where tradesmen offer you the no-vat cash price, simply as an option. They don't seem to even realise it's illegal. That wasn't the case even 20 years ago: they at least looked shifty when offering it then. Tax is now seen as optional, which obviously isn't sustainable.

I was always against ID cards, because I prefer as little state intrusion as practical. But I now think that ID cards, strict checks and heavy fines on employers hiring illegally or evading tax is the only way to get back from where we are now.

That's why the French don't put more effort into stopping the small boats. They think our lack of employment controls is ridiculous, and the resulting illegal immigration is our own fault and entirely within our control.

But not some half-assed implementation of ID cards without enforcing employment and tax laws. That would be the worst of all worlds: expensive to roll out, intrusive and pointless.

To the extent that I wish to influence policy (if Keir Starmer's team is reading random Mumsnet threads), I'd like there to be more tiers based on some combination of earnings, origin country, job sector etc, so that overall the immigration system favours profiles of people who are likely to both contribute financially and integrate well culturally, and gives those people more favourable terms including faster settlement and citizenship

This is probably the most sensible answer to immigration. Problem is that it doesn’t suit the bleeding hearts of the world. I don’t see anything wrong with wanting your country to be filled with quality contributing humans of any origin.

There should be a quota for how many refugees a country can accept and that should not be more than any system can deal with or to the detriment of maintaining your country national identity. When your own citizens start to feel the pinch and don’t feel like their own country is familiar to them then you’ve lost your way.