Contribution
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Pritchard. I thank all those from across the Chamber who have contributed to this important debate, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell) for moving the motion on behalf of the Petitions Committee. I also thank Shannon who started the petition and the over 100,000 people who signed it. The petition was concluded before the general election, but it has been brought forward for debate in the House.
It is important to address the point raised by the hon. Member for Bradford East (Imran Hussain) about the delays in Home Office cases. That is a separate matter from the one we are discussing. However, I will say that we inherited a Home Office with utterly chaotic systems. The huge amount—£700 million—spent on the Rwanda scheme and the diversion of caseworkers have partly contributed to the chaos that we have seen across a number of visa routes. I hope that we are starting to bring that under some control, so that applications can be processed more swiftly and people are not left waiting as long as they have been.
It is also important to make the point that migration has always been a part of our nation’s history. For generations, people have travelled here from all over the world to contribute to our economy, study in our universities, work in our public services and be part of our communities. Indeed, British citizens also continue to travel across the world and may choose to make their home abroad. We recognise and value the contribution that legal migration makes to our country, but as the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam), and all those across the House will be aware, we have said that net migration, which reached record highs under the last Government—over 900,000 in the year ending June 2023—is unsustainable. It needs to come down, and we have made that commitment. However, there has been a broader conversation in the contributions from Members across the House. I will endeavour to respond to the specific points raised, but first I want to set out the background to the minimum income requirement, or the MIR. I will set out how it came about and what our position is now.
As we know, appendix FM was brought into the immigration rules in 2012 to set out the requirements for family members wishing to come to or stay in the UK on the basis of their relationship with a family member who is British or settled here. It also brought the MIR into the immigration rules, with the aim of ensuring that family migrants could be supported at a reasonable level by their sponsoring family member so that, as has been raised, there was no unreasonable burden on the British taxpayer and to help to ensure that they had the independence and means to participate sufficiently in everyday life, to support themselves and to facilitate integration into Britain.
The right to family life is a qualified right, and the family immigration rules, including the MIR, carefully balance that right against the legitimate aim of protecting the economic wellbeing of the UK. Expecting family migrants and their sponsors to be financially independent is reasonable to both them and the taxpayer. In 2017, the Supreme Court agreed that this principle strikes a fair balance between the interests of those wishing to sponsor a partner to settle in the UK and the community in general.
When the MIR was introduced as part of the changes to the immigration rules, it was set at £18,600, following advice from the Migration Advisory Committee. At that time, the figure represented the level of income that a family could receive at which point they would cease to be eligible for income support. Between its introduction and April 2024, it was not increased in line with inflation or real wages or adjusted in the light of rising numbers of migrants using the route. The previous Government then decided to raise the MIR to bring it in line with the median income for skilled workers, which is currently £38,700. The decision was made without consultation and without the benefit of advice from the Migration Advisory Committee.
Shortly afterwards, the Conservative Government decided to implement the rise incrementally. The first increase, to £29,000, took place in April 2024, and no further changes have yet taken place. It is our view that any change must be underpinned by a solid evidence base and form part of a system that is fair, clear and consistent. To achieve that, as has been mentioned, the Home Secretary has commissioned the Migration Advisory Committee to review the financial requirements in the family immigration rules. That includes the level of the MIR and how it can be met.