The UK government has revised its plan to increase the earnings threshold required for people who want to bring their families to the country on visas. In December, Home Secretary James Cleverly announced that a threshold of £38,700 would be required for a person to bring their partner or dependant to the UK. However, a document released on Thursday revealed that the threshold would instead be set at £29,000 per year – “as part of an initial implementation” – in the spring. The current threshold is £18,600.
The government has been under pressure to tighten controls on legal migration, following record numbers of people arriving in the UK in 2022. Net migration – the difference between the number of people entering and leaving the country -stood at 745,000. Lord Sharpe of Epsom, the Home Office minister, confirmed the change of plan and said that the new threshold would be increased in incremental stages. The threshold would be raised to £34,500 (at the 40th percentile) and eventually to the 50th percentile (£38,700), which is the level at which the general skilled worker threshold is set.
Labour MP Sir Stephen Timms had cautioned that the proposed new threshold would affect the marriage plans of many couples. However, the announcement of lower thresholds has been welcomed as a U-turn. In response, the prime minister announced that the government was looking at “transitional arrangements” for these changes to ensure their fairness. The Liberal Democrats criticised the government’s originally planned £38,700 threshold, claiming it was “unworkable” and said that decisions like this should be made by experts and politicians working together
Read the full article from The BBC here: Read More