The government’s proposed changes to settlement are set to be some of the most significant to UK immigration policy in a generation.
While the politics of the moment may demand audacious policymaking, successful delivery of the policy’s core objectives depends on engaging with some very real trade-offs. Incentivising English language, employment and volunteering can all improve integration, but extended periods of migrant ‘unsettlement’ can harm it, with long-term consequences for community cohesion.
In our submission to the Government’s consultation on earned settlement, we put forward a series of recommendations that would provide a fairer pathway to settlement for refugees: capping routes to settlement at 10 years; treating migrants already here fairly and consistently; and ensuring any changes are informed by careful consideration of their impacts on equalities, child rights, economic growth and living standards.