The UK Home Office kicked off 2024 with a comms campaign stating they are “fully committed to seeing a decisive cut in migration” with slogans such as “stop the boats” being used alongside reminders that changes to student dependant rules are “now in force”.
Immigration fear is once again a central theme for a national election but this time students are being dragged into the political fray.
British prime minister Rishi Sunak took the unprecedented step of personally tweeting that the government is “delivering for the British people” by preventing the majority of international students from bringing their family members to the UK, as visa changes came into force on 1 January.
Cue national debate about what constitutes a ‘genuine’ student, why a student would want to bring loved ones with them to a study destination and what is a legitimate edu-immigration pathway?
