Recent reports suggest that international students will no longer be allowed to bring their spouses and children to the UK if they don’t enroll in high-value degrees, such as math, engineering, and science.
According to reports, the increase in the number of family members accompanying international students is alarming for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Home Secretary Suella Braverman.
In case you don’t know, the UK allows family members of student visa holders to come to the country.
It seems the majority of dependents who accompanied student visa holders to the UK in 2022 were Nigerians.
Plus, Nigerians also caused the largest increase in sponsored study grants, increasing them by 57545 to as high as 65929. This concluded that Nigerians were the third largest nationality group in the last year.
Another news report revealed that the authorities issued 490763 student visas last year. Consequently, international students brought 135788 dependents with them. This is a notable increase compared to the stats in 2019 when these numbers were at 16047.
Moreover, international students won’t be allowed to bring families unless they are studying for a Master’s degree or Ph.D.
Regardless, members of parliament and universities are not in favour of these proposals since research shows that international students have an annual contribution of £35 billion to the UK’s economy.
It should be noted that this is the latest attempt by Braverman to keep migrants from coming to the UK.
As per reports, the Home Secretary proposed reforming the graduate visa route by making it necessary for international students to acquire a work visa by securing a skilled job. Otherwise, they would have to exit the country within six months of graduating.
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