LONDON – The family members of students studying in the United Kingdom might not be able to join them soon as authorities are mulling plans to discourage such practice.
Authorities in the kingdom are exploring plans to prevent family members from joining foreign masters students at the country’s universities, a move which will affect hundreds of thousands of students.
The ruling Conservative Party is not pro-immigration and a visible indication in this regard is that before 2019 elections, it had vowed to reduce migration levels. Fresh data in this regard would be out on May 25th but experts suggest that migration reached record levels in 2022.
Three of the departments, the United Kingdom’s Department of Education, Home Office and Treasury are currently discussing the plan to stop dependents from travelling with masters students for one-year courses. If the plans to curb family members joining the students are materialized, students from India and Nigeria would be affected largely.
“Many of these courses only last for nine months. We don’t think this will have a big effect on our ability to attract global talent,” an unidentified official told the Financial Times.
Though official details have yet to surface on what is going to be banned, relying on previous reports suggests that only international students studying science, mathematics, and engineering will be able to bring their dependents to the UK.
If the family members are actually barred from joining students, the experts suggest UK universities can face financial hardship as roughly international students add 35 billion pounds a year to the economy.
As far as official statistics regarding visas are concerned, the number of visas awarded to dependents of foreign students increased from 16,047 in 2019 to 1,35,788 in 2022.
Despite the campaigns by multiple groups against immigration on one pretext or the other, the United Kingdom issued nearly 5,00,000 study visas in 2022, 81% higher as compared to 2019.
If the period from June 2021 to June 2022 is examined, net migration to the Kingdom reached record levels, mainly due to migrants from outside European Union countries.
