The government’s proposed set of new immigration rules intended to promote growth which is controlled and managed have come under fire from those who could be affected by them.
The Immigration White Paper outlines changes such as an increased time needed to qualify for settlement to ten years, the need for a degree to qualify for a skilled worker visa, and increased English language requirements even for dependents.
Titled Restoring Control Over the Immigration System, it aims to curb a steady growth in net migration through the new policies, but small business owner Zeina Al Khaznachi disagreed with the proposal.
She said:”I think the new policies are an abomination, and it’s unfair.
“I have a lot of friends of mine who are on a visa, and I’m really concerned about them.
“People have lives that they’re planning, they have things that they want to strive to.
“They’re already on this route, and the fact that the white paper hasn’t addressed whether the current people are going to be impacted by this is not fair to people.”
The white paper itself is not a change of the law, it simply outlines changes the government intend to enact in the future.
However, the general nature of this plan may cause confusion and concern for current immigrants in the country along with people abroad who are considering migrating in the near future.
In the last three years, there has been a small, but nonetheless upward trend in concern about immigration.
According to Office for National Statistics data, immigration and international conflict have ranked higher as a factor of concern for British adults than education and employment.
Al Khaznachi is of Palestinian, Iraqi and Jordanian descent, and came to London for work in 2017.
Born and raised in Jordan, she pursued a second postgraduate degree during that time to establish her path to settlement, and now owns a jewellery business.
She said: “I came to London on an intra-company transfer visa, but irrespective of how many years you stay, you wouldn’t be allowed indefinite leave to remain or a port.
“At the time, the options for me to change to a visa that would allow me to apply for that were to get a salary of £120,000 or leave the UK physically.
“The only alternative I had was to do a graduate degree in the UK so eventually I could go back on a visa that would eventually grant me the port and indefinite leave to remain.”
Tuition fees for British students will go up next year by 3.1% for inflation to £9,535, but international students’ tuition is not capped.
The most expensive degree in the UK is for Medicine at Cambridge University, which costs a staggering £70,554 for foreign students.
Furthermore, stricter compliance rules on universities have been proposed, which will make it harder for them to sponsor student visas.
Al Khaznachi said: “In my time as an international student, I had to pay three times more than a British student, and now for you to tell me that I might even have to pay more, that’s ridiculous.
“I would definitely consider somewhere else in mainland Europe, where I can have a degree that’s equally as good and more financially manageable for me.
“I don’t think this is good for the UK, because I think there’ll be fewer people from international students.”
Beyond the suggestion to reduce the standard length of graduate visas from two years to 18 months, future immigrants and even their dependents may also have to attain higher standards of English.
Al Khaznachi said: “I come from a country that was basically built by immigrants.
“You had Palestinians, Syrians, Iraqi – all these immigrants have contributed so much to the building of the Jordanian economy.
“Bringing in people from diverse backgrounds and diverse ways of thinking, in my opinion, just makes a country even better.”
The white paper also comes at a time when the Home Office has recorded increases in hate crime in recent years.
Events such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the Southport riots marked particularly distressing times for immigrants as well, but Al Khaznachi explained those were just occurences which gained mainstream attention.
She said: “I’ve experienced racism ever since I arrived in the UK, it’s the main reason why I burned out in my first job.
“I’m quite white ing and I don’t have what you would call a very distinct accent, and yet within the job, I was made to feel like I was inferior, that no matter what I did or that I was not good enough.
“So I have always experienced racism, albeit it was maybe overt rather than covert.”
The Home Office was approached for comment.
Feature image: Castor Chan
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