From visas to jobs to residency: How UK’s new immigration rules may spell trouble for Indians

The United Kingdom, under Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour government, is embarking on a sweeping overhaul of its immigration system in what is being described as a bid to “finally take back control” of the country’s borders.

Starmer on Monday said that migrants "make a massive contribution" to Britain but alleged the country risks becoming an "island of strangers" without more controls. He added that he wanted net migration to have fallen "significantly" by the next election, likely in 2029, but refused say by how much.

These drastic measures, which aim to slash legal migration and appeal to growing right-wing sentiment, are expected to disproportionately hurt Indian nationals—currently among the largest groups migrating to the UK for work, study, and caregiving roles.

New Rules

Unveiled in the government’s new Immigration White Paper, the reforms include:

• Doubling the minimum residency requirement for settlement and citizenship from 5 to 10 years.
• Closing care worker visas to new overseas applicants.
• Tightening English language requirements for adult dependents.
• Reducing post-study work rights for international students.
• Requiring skilled foreign workers to have a university degree.
• Cutting 50,000 lower-skilled worker visas this year.
• Introducing fast-track settlement options for ‘high-skilled’ migrants.

While pitched as necessary controls to manage migration levels that hit a record 906,000 in 2023, these changes come at a steep cost to countries like India—whose nationals have built strong educational, professional, and familial bridges with the UK.

Why Indians Will Be Among the Worst Hit

• Indian nationals made up a significant share of the UK’s social care workforce, often migrating on health and care worker visas introduced during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. With the acute shortage in the UK’s aged care sector, Indian caregivers had become essential—filling in gaps that domestic hiring couldn't. By closing this route suddenly, thousands of prospective Indian migrants will lose employment opportunities.

Care England has already condemned the move as "cruel" and "short-sighted."

• Doubling the settlement timeline from five to ten years adds to financial and emotional uncertainty for migrants. Many Indians who move to the UK on long-term skilled worker or student-dependent visas plan their lives around obtaining settlement status in five years.

Now, they'll either need to spend twice as long in a precarious visa situation or navigate new, fast-tracked but opaque ‘high-skilled’ exemptions—which are yet to be defined clearly. This could make the UK far less attractive than other destinations like Canada or Australia, which offer clearer, more predictable pathways to permanent residency.

• Indian students form the largest group of international students in the UK, crossing 142,000 in 2023 alone. The post-study work visa (Graduate Route), which allowed a two-year stay after course completion, was a major factor in the UK’s appeal—especially after Brexit made EU access more difficult. Reducing this period will severely impact return on investment for Indian families, who often take out large loans to finance UK education.

• Under the new rules, adult dependents will need to meet basic English proficiency requirements—a provision that will particularly hurt Indian families trying to reunite in the UK.