UK softens settlement plan for care workers amid immigration policy backlash

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UK care worker settlement

Highlights

Revised Home Office proposals allow care workers earning over £25,000 to apply for indefinite leave after five years, benefiting an estimated 146,000 workers and 136,000 dependants.
The plan shortens most care workers' settlement route from 15 to 10 years, with an accelerated pathway possible for those meeting higher contribution criteria.
Home Office projects £10 billion in future public spending for care sector residency from 2026-2030, while IPPR forecasts skilled migrants will contribute £115 billion in net taxes over their lifetimes.

Revised settlement routes and eligibility

As reported by The Guardian, citing the Home Office, care workers earning more than £25,000 will be able to apply for indefinite leave to remain after five years under revised proposals published on Monday. The consultation response says workers in occupations below RQF Level 6 will no longer face the previously proposed 15-year pathway and will instead move onto a 10-year route, with scope to qualify sooner through an accelerated pathway if they meet stronger contribution requirements.

The document estimates that about 146,000 care workers and 136,000 dependants will be eligible for the five-year route. Officials also say about 100,000 skilled workers, including butchers and chefs, will have to wait 10 years before applying for settlement.

The wider framework remains tough for other groups. People earning more than £125,000 will be able to settle within three years, while those earning more than £50,271 and some public service workers such as doctors, nurses and teachers will be able to settle after five years.

Anyone arriving in breach of immigration rules will face a minimum 20-year wait before being able to apply. Refugees who enter by small boat and rely on public funds are set to wait at least 30 years for permanent settlement, while refugees entering legally and then claiming asylum may wait up to 20 years, reduced to 10 years if they move into sustained work or study and show sufficient earnings and contribution.

Political pressure and fiscal implications

The softer approach for care workers follows pushback from trade unions, care providers and senior Labour figures, including housing secretary Angela Rayner and London mayor Sadiq Khan. Earlier plans would have required 117,000 low-paid care workers and their 79,000 dependants to wait up to 15 years for indefinite leave to remain.

Pressure to tighten immigration rules is growing as larger cohorts of migrants who arrived during Boris Johnson's administration approach the current five-year threshold for settlement. Home Office projections from last year indicate that granting permanent residency to care sector staff and their adult family members from 2026 through 2030 could imply lifetime public spending of roughly £10 billion.

At the same time, analysis published on Monday points to a positive long-term fiscal effect from skilled migration. The Institute for Public Policy Research says skilled migrants and their adult dependants due to settle in the UK under current rules are expected to make a net lifetime contribution of about £115 billion through taxes paid.

Mahmood meets union general secretaries on Monday to finalise details of the plan. Most of the tougher measures introduced in earlier proposals remain in place, underscoring that the policy shift is a targeted concession to the care sector rather than a broader easing of the government's earned-settlement agenda.

In our earlier article, we looked at Chancellor John Healey’s pre-Budget message that the UK will stick to a deficit-reduction path ahead of the October 28 fiscal statement. We also highlighted the latest GDP reading showing modest economic resilience, alongside rising political pressure over how the government can support growth while keeping a tight grip on public finances.

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