UK to wait twice as long for permanent residency, with exemptions for carers | Labor rights news

The United Kingdom has revised its immigration rules, doubling the wait time for most foreign workers to obtain permanent residency to 10 years and forcing refugees arriving on “small boats” to wait up to 30 years.

Interior Minister Shabana Mahmood, speaking in Parliament on Monday, said hundreds of thousands of care workers would be exempt from the harsh rules, offering a concession amid a political uproar within the ruling Labor Party.

Permanent residence, known in the UK as indefinite leave to remain, gives the right to work, study, use the free National Health Service and claim welfare benefits. Until now, it was granted after five years.

The new rules, which are expected to take effect next year, tie eligibility for permanent residency to income.

People earning more than 50,000 pounds a year ($67,000) will still be able to apply after five years, and those earning more than 125,000 pounds ($167,500) after three years. Everyone else will be placed on the 10 year path. The median salary in the UK is around 39,000 pounds (around $52,000).

The rules will apply retroactively to workers already in the country.

“Settlement should not be automatic. It should be earned,” Mahmood, the interior minister, told parliament, adding that the changes would restore fairness by linking the right to settle to immigrants’ contribution.

“Those who contribute the most will settle in the quickest,” she said. “Those who don’t follow the rules will be turned away or wait longer.”

Healthcare workers, refugees

The British government first proposed last year that low-skilled workers should wait 10 to 15 years to obtain permanent residency.

But the plan has attracted fierce opposition from unions and parts of the Labor Party, particularly because of its effects on care workers, who are often poorly paid and work in a sector that has long struggled to fill vacancies. Many of them arrived in the early 2020s, as the country recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic, to fill the void left by European workers who left after Brexit.

Under the revised plan, caregivers will be able to settle after five years if they meet their visa requirements and earn at least 25,000 pounds ($33,500) a year.

Mahmood said the rules would provide a pathway for caregivers “who have worked hard and answered our call when we needed them.”

As for refugees, those arriving via one of the government’s “new safe and legal routes” will be able to settle after five years, she said. For other refugees, the standard wait will increase to 20 years, reduced to 10 years for those working or studying. Anyone arriving by an “illegal method,” such as by small boat, could wait up to 30 years to settle, she said.

Under the new rules, applicants will also be disqualified if they have a criminal record, cannot speak English “to a high level”, owe money to the government or have not paid at least three years into national insurance.

Mahmood said the overhaul would mean half a million people would settle later than they otherwise would have, saving the government billions of pounds in benefits.

In total, the government estimates that up to 1.4 million people will obtain permanent resident status between 2026 and 2030.

The changes, announced after a 12-week public consultation which attracted more than 200,000 responses, are part of a wider effort to tighten immigration rules after a surge in arrivals following Brexit.

They are a response to political pressure, notably from Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK party, which has gained popularity in recent years with calls for tougher migration controls. Reform UK has sought to portray the arrival of refugees on small boats across the Channel as a crisis, and anti-immigration campaigners have staged protests, including outside facilities housing asylum seekers.

Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s government said increased law enforcement cooperation between the UK and France had helped reduce the number of people crossing the border by more than 40% this year compared to 2025.