The British government on Monday announced plans to double the period many immigrants must wait before becoming eligible for permanent residency, while exempting key workers and high earners from the extended requirement.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said people arriving in the UK on work visas will generally have to wait 10 years to qualify for permanent settlement, which allows them to work, study, access free healthcare and claim benefits.
However, those earning at least 50,000 pounds ($67,000) annually, along with public-sector workers such as doctors, nurses and teachers, will remain eligible after five years. Immigrants earning more than 125,000 pounds a year will be able to apply after just three years.
Mahmood said the changes would be introduced in 2027 and were intended to make the immigration system fairer by linking permanent residency rights to migrants' contributions to the country.
Addressing lawmakers, she referred to her parents' arrival from Pakistan around 50 years ago, saying they had come to Britain because they believed in its commitment to fairness.
The revised plan is a relaxation of proposals she presented last year, which faced opposition from some members of the governing Labour Party. The earlier proposal would have required lower-paid migrant workers, including those employed in care homes, to wait 15 years for permanent settlement.
Care workers will continue to qualify after five years, provided they earn at least 25,000 pounds annually. The median annual salary in the UK is around 39,000 pounds.
Immigration has remained a contentious political issue in Britain for decades and was a major factor behind the 2016 Brexit referendum, which led to the country's departure from the European Union and ended the bloc's freedom of movement arrangements.
The arrival of tens of thousands of asylum seekers in small boats across the English Channel each year has also kept immigration at the centre of political debate.
Politicians, including Nigel Farage of the right-wing Reform UK party, have portrayed the crossings as a crisis, while anti-immigration protests have targeted Channel ports, asylum accommodation facilities and even a lifeboat charity involved in rescuing people at sea.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham's Labour government said stronger law enforcement cooperation with France had helped reduce small-boat arrivals by more than 40 percent so far this year compared with 2025.
Mahmood also announced tougher settlement requirements for refugees who did not arrive through safe and legal routes, such as government-sponsored programmes. They will have to wait up to 20 years for permanent residency, while those arriving by small boats will face a waiting period of up to 30 years.
Although small-boat arrivals account for only a fraction of overall immigration, most migrants enter Britain legally on visas, the growing popularity of Reform UK has pushed both Labour and the Conservative Party towards tougher immigration policies.
Conservative immigration spokesman Chris Philp criticised the revised plan, calling it a “U-turn” and claiming it would cost 10 billion pounds by allowing more people to access benefits than under the original proposal.
Liberal Democrat lawmaker Max Wilkinson said the government was prioritising tough rhetoric instead of developing an effective immigration system.
Critics of the changes argue that the government is responding to an immigration surge that has already subsided.
Net migration, which measures the difference between the number of people entering and leaving the UK, exceeded 900,000 in the year ending June 2023. The increase was partly driven by people fleeing the war in Ukraine and China's crackdown in Hong Kong.
According to the Office for National Statistics, net migration fell to 649,000 in the year ending June 2024 and 204,000 in the year ending June 2025. The figure stood at 171,000 in the latest available period, the year ending December 2025.