UK Announces Stricter Visa Measures To Reduce Migration

Published

2 years ago

December 4, 2023

Editor

The UK has announced it would raise the minimum salary threshold for a skilled worker visa and prevent overseas health and social care staff from bringing family dependents to Britain.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s office trumpeted the proposals as “the biggest clampdown on legal migration ever”.

But critics said it would damage the state-run National Health Service (NHS), which faces staff shortages.

Immigration is set to be a key issue in nationwide elections that must be held by January 2025 at the latest, and which the main opposition Labour party is currently favoured to win.

Sunak has pledged to reduce new arrivals and has been under pressure ever since statistics released last month showed that net migration to Britain hit a high in 2022.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said the number of people who arrived in Britain last year was 745,000 more than the number who left.

Interior minister James Cleverly said his plan would result in 300,000 fewer people coming to the UK in the coming years.

“Enough is enough,” the home secretary told parliament as he laid out his proposals, which will take effect early next year.

Cleverly said skilled foreign workers wanting a UK visa would have to earn £38,700 ($48,860), up from £26,200 and in line with the median full-time wage.

He exempted health and social care workers, but said they would be prevented from bringing family dependents.

NHS Providers, which represents hospital groups in England, said changes that might deter care workers from coming to the UK were “deeply concerning”.

Care England, a charity representing independent adult social care providers, said immigration had been “saving the social care sector”. Staff shortages have been exacerbated by Brexit.

Cleverly also raised the minimum income for family visas to £38,700 and confirmed restrictions on international students bringing dependents.

He reaffirmed that Britain would increase the surcharge that migrants pay to access the NHS by 66 percent, to £1,035.

Critics have said this effectively imposes a double charge on migrant workers, as employees also pay National Insurance charges, which go towards covering healthcare.

Do or die

Cleverly added that the government would reform the “shortage occupation list”, which details jobs for which employers are not able to find enough British workers.

The Conservatives won a landslide under the leadership of Boris Johnson at the last election in 2019, largely on a promise to bring net migration numbers down.

The party has repeatedly promised that leaving the European Union, which ended the free movement of people from member states, would allow the UK to “take back control” of its borders.

But regular migration has soared since Britain formally left the EU in January 2020. In 2021, net migration was 488,000.

The ONS data piled pressure on Sunak from his own MPs to take action, with some right-wingers arguing that the issue was “do or die” for the party.

In opinion polls, the Tories, in power since 2010, lag well behind centre-left Labour, which also claims regular migration is too high.

Labour’s home affairs spokesperson Yvette Cooper accused the Conservatives of being in a “chaotic panic” over immigration.

“Today’s statement is an admission of years of total failure by this Conservative government,” she told parliament.

Sunak is also struggling to cut the number of irregular arrivals crossing the Channel from northern France on small boats.

About 30,000 have undertaken the dangerous crossing this year.

The government has deemed such crossings illegal but its much-trumpeted plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda was struck down by the courts last month.

Cleverly is due to visit Kigali soon, possibly this week, to finalise a new treaty. The government has also said it is working on “emergency legislation” to get deportation flights going by spring.

Thousands Protest In Tehran Against Israel

Published

4 hours ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

Thousands of people joined a protest against Israel in the Iranian capital on Friday after weekly prayers, chanting slogans in support of their leaders, images on state television showed.

“This is the Friday of the Iranian nation’s solidarity and resistance across the country,” the news anchor said.

Footage showed protesters in Tehran holding up photographs of commanders killed since the start of the war with Israel, while others waved the flags of Iran and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

“I will sacrifice my life for my leader,” read a protester’s banner, a reference to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

According to state television, protests took place in other cities around the country, including in Tabriz in northwestern Iran and Shiraz in the south.

AFP

Over 650 Die In Iran After First Week Of Israeli Strikes

Published

5 hours ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

More than 650 people have been killed in Iran following a massive Israeli bombing campaign launched a week ago, an activist group said on Friday.

The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA) reported that 657 people have died and 2,037 have been injured in the nationwide airstrikes.

The Iranian government does not publish daily figures on casualties.

HRANA relies on a broad network of informants and publicly available sources.

The group said the dead include at least 263 civilians and 164 members of the military.

Another 230 fatalities remain unidentified.

The network also reported damage to civilian infrastructure, including a projectile striking a children’s hospital in Tehran, which did not result in any injuries.

In the western province of Ilam, a fire station was damaged, HRANA said, while an Israeli attack on a car factory in western Iran triggered a large fire.

Israel maintains its objective is to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, which it considers an existential threat.

UK Joins Other Nations In Pulling Embassy Staff From Iran

Published

5 hours ago

June 20, 2025

Editor

Britain on Friday withdrew its embassy staff from Iran, following in the footsteps of other European nations as well as Australia and New Zealand amid the conflict with Israel.

“Due to the current security situation, we have taken the precautionary measure to temporarily withdraw our UK staff from Iran,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

“Our embassy continues to operate remotely,” it added.

On the eighth day of the war between Iran and Israel, the British ministry said it continued to call for de-escalation between the two sides.

But the statement added: “We take the protection of our staff and British nationals extremely seriously and we have long advised against all travel to Iran.”

Earlier Friday, Australia also shuttered its Tehran embassy and ordered officials to leave the country, Sydney said, citing a “deteriorating security situation”.

Both countries join a string of nations closing diplomatic missions in Iran since Israel launched air strikes a week ago, claiming its arch enemy was on the verge of developing a nuclear weapon.

Australia has directed all its officials and their dependents to leave Iran, and suspended its Tehran embassy operations, Foreign Minister Penny Wong told a news conference in Adelaide.

“This is not a decision taken lightly. It is a decision based on the deteriorating security environment in Iran,” she said.

Wong said there were about 2,000 Australians and family members registered in Iran who wanted to depart, and another 1,200 in Israel.

Other nations that have suspended Tehran embassy operations include Bulgaria, Czech Republic, New Zealand, Portugal, and Switzerland.

Switzerland said it was temporarily closing its diplomatic mission in the Iranian capital, but would continue to fulfil is role in representing US interests in Iran.

“In view of the intensity of military operations in Iran and the highly unstable situation on the ground, the FDFA has decided to temporarily close the Swiss embassy in Tehran,” the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs said.

European powers meanwhile met with Iranian officials in Geneva on Friday, and hoped to offer “a diplomatic solution”, according to French President Emmanuel Macron.

Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy said “a window now exists within the next two weeks to achieve a diplomatic solution”, while agreeing with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio that “Iran can never develop or acquire a nuclear weapon”.

AFP