Visa figures fall again – but is it enough?

It’s a big day for stats in British politics. Following the news that inflation has dropped to 2.3 per cent, the Home Office has this morning published its latest figures for visa applications. They reveal a 25 per cent fall across all visa routes in the first four months of 2024, following the package of changes that the Home Secretary announced in December 2023. The most significant drop was in student dependant numbers, which fell by 79 per cent. 

This big fall is one of the reasons why Home Secretary James Cleverly is reluctant to clamp down even further on the graduate visa route. Last week’s report by the Migration Advisory Committee disappointed some Tory MPs, who have significant concerns about the number of visas being handed out. Now that the Rwanda Bill has passed into law, some Tories think that the ‘die is cast’ on illegal migration. There has been great pressure to focus on bringing down legal migration numbers, where the Home Secretary has more levers to pull. 

The cabinet, however, is split on further changes. Both Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, and Lord Cameron, the foreign secretary, have warned Cleverly of the dangers of clamping down on graduate visas. Cleverly and his team are wary of taking what one calls ‘a sledgehammer’ to the graduate route, as universities and the economy start to feel the hit of these changes.

The fact that the existing changes have seen such a big fall in student dependants will therefore be held up as vindication by Home Office ministers that their existing changes are working. Cleverly will likely urge MPs to ‘stick to the plan’, just as how Jeremy Hunt is saying similar on the economy. After the record post-pandemic years, these figures allow Sunak’s government to claim it is finally getting net migration back until control.

The Office for National Statistics figures out tomorrow though are expected to tell another story. These cover the period up until December 2023 and will therefore not take account of the changes that the Home Office made to visa routes in December. It is no surprise then that some Tories want to see further visa changes announced either in the coming months or as part of a manifesto package at the next election.