A regulation has been implemented in the UK that prohibits Nigerian students and other international students from bringing their families as dependents unless certain conditions are met.
This is in an effort by the UK government to reduce immigration, which is now at roughly 1 million per year.
To prevent abuse of the visa system, the UK will no longer allow international students to switch from the student path to the employment route before their studies are finished.
According to Sky News, “there will also be a review of the maintenance requirement for students and dependents and a crackdown on ‘unscrupulous’ education agents who ‘use inappropriate applications to sell immigration, not education.”
This change takes effect January 2024 to allow students starting courses in the UK time to plan to adapt to the new rules.
This new law comes after indications had emerged that the UK plans to put stricter laws in place to bring down the climbing number of immigrants into the country via studies.
In a written ministerial statement on Tuesday, Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, said recent immigration figures had shown an “unexpected rise” in the number of dependants coming to the UK alongside international students.
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According to Braverman, the increase was made after the government made its commitment to lower net migration, the UK media house reported.
Braverman said while the government’s strategy around international education “plays an important part in supporting the economy”, it should “not be at the expense of our commitment to the public to lower overall migration”.
The plan, according to Braverman, strikes the ideal mix between taking decisive action to address net migration and safeguarding the economic advantages that students may provide for the UK.
A statement on the UK’s Home Office official site adds that the
New government restrictions to student visa routes will substantially cut net migration by restricting the ability for international students to bring family members on all but post-graduate research routes and banning people from using a student visa as a backdoor route to work in the UK.
The ONS estimated that net migration was over 500,000 from June 2021 to June 2022. Although partly attributed to the rise in temporary factors, such as the UK’s Ukraine and Hong Kong schemes, last year almost half a million student visas were issued while the number of dependants of overseas students has increased by 750% since 2019, to 136,000 people.
