At the heart of the debate around legal migration are contested notions of fairness. Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has talked of her parents coming to the UK from rural Kashmir. Now, this daughter of immigrants is responsible for reshaping the very system that brought them here decades ago – and doing so in a way that both her party and the country regard as fair.
"Fair to those who seek a new and better life here, like my parents did. And fair to those already here, including British workers, and especially the young," is how Mahmood put it in her speech to the Labour Party conference in September. The debate has come at a time of huge legal immigration in recent years and during a period in which Reform UK have been particularly prominent in the national political conversation.
Both of these things are factors in Labour wanting to be seen to be taking people's concerns about the scale of arrivals seriously. But her political opponents smell what they see as weakness and retreat, with parts of her original plan now being revised, as the BBC's Iain Watson reported over the weekend. It is worth examining this policy throughout the last year or so, as it is instructive in how we have arrived at today's announcement.
Mahmood to set out changes to settlement rules for legal migrants Fahnbulleh says she backs home secretary on migration after comments to journalists In November last year, Mahmood set out a plan called "a fairer pathway to settlement". The idea was opinions on her instincts would be sought in a consultation. And boy, were their plenty of opinions offered.
Around 200,000 people contributed to the consultation, of which 140,000 responses came from visa holders themselves I'm told. "It's been a colossal exercise and a genuine one," is how one Whitehall source put it to me, claiming: "We have taken the time to get this right." Or is the real truth that they have buckled under political pressure from their own side – and a change of prime minister? Mahmood said last year that she felt compelled to act because "between 2021 and 2024, we have seen net migration of an additional 2.6 million people.
Around one in every 30 people in this country today arrived in these four years." It is what critics have labelled "the Boriswave", named for the changes made under former Prime Minister Boris Johnson. And, Mahmood argued, it was important to act with urgency, as very soon significant numbers of those recent arrivals would start qualifying for indefinite leave to remain, or ILR. "Migrants on lower wages who bring non-working dependants and children are likely to present significant fiscal costs to the UK.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
