Migration
This article is more than 2 months old
Government reduces minimum salary for migrants to
settle in UK
Mattha Busby
Sat 24 Oct 2020 18.46 BST
The government has quietly reduced the £35,800 minimum salary for migrants to
settle in the UK by almost 30%, it has emerged.
Migrants on salaries of £20,480 but with enough points under Boris Johnson’s new
Australian-style immigration system to qualify for jobs where there is a shortage of
workers will also be entitled to settle after six years and become citizens.
The rules, which come into force on 1 December, were published on Thursday by the
Home Office, with the general threshold lowered to £25,600 as the government
tacitly acknowledged the essential contribution that lower paid migrant workers
make to the UK.
Amnesty International UK said it was troubled by the way immigration rules,
including salary thresholds, “have long exaggerated the privilege of people already
advantaged by their relative wealth, gender and race”.