Under the revised plans, care workers who entered the route before May 2025 and earn at least £25,000 a year can qualify for settlement after five years rather than the 15 originally proposed. The Home Office also reversed its refusal to let the family of Rasika Samarasinghe, a care worker from Sri Lanka, remain in the UK as his dependants. A Home Office spokesperson said applications initially rejected could be approved after a review.
The government began restricting care workers' family visas after the Home Office estimated in 2023 that about 120,000 dependants had joined 100,000 care worker applicants, and banned overseas recruitment from July 2025. Samarasinghe's family arrived before both restrictions. "I felt so shocked and hopeless when the Home Office said my wife and children could no longer stay here," he said. "Now we can plan our future. I feel free now."
But other migrants face prolonged uncertainty. Aneisha Williams, a 39-year-old supermarket worker from London who married a British man in Jamaica, was months from qualifying for indefinite leave to remain under the 10-year route. After claiming housing benefit while homeless, she said it could now be another 10 years before settlement. "It's a racist policy," she said. "The only time we're regarded as human beings is when they need a lot of hands onboard, like during Covid. But after that, we're tossed away like we're some rubbish."
Ashley, a civil servant from Sheffield who arrived from the US and is married to a British man, fears waiting until 2030, by which time she estimates she will have spent £25,000 on visa and healthcare charges. "I'm one of the privileged immigrants – from a white English-speaking country, I have a PhD. I'm married to a British citizen. And it is still so unbelievably hard," she said.
The Home Office estimates about 500,000 people will have to wait longer than five years for settlement, which officials say will save billions from the welfare bill. Campaigner Dr Dora-Olivia Vicol, chief executive of the Work Rights Centre, called the response, apart from the care-worker concessions, "bitterly disappointing", while Naga Kandiah of MTC Solicitors welcomed the Home Office's U-turn in Samarasinghe's family's case as "a hugely significant and positive outcome."
Care worker Amenzei Ogiemwonyia, who campaigned with Unison, said: "Some of us are elated – but we still need to read the fine print."