The UK government is preparing a fresh crackdown on the abuse of student visas, after figures showed that one in nine of all asylum claims last year came from people who had arrived on study visas, GB News reported. Ministers say they want to get a firmer handle on the problem and have described their approach as tough but fair, framing it as a move against abuse of the system rather than against international students themselves.
Under the plans, the government intends to set new targets for each institution covering course attendance and course pass rates, with officials looking for figures of around 90%. Universities and colleges that fall short of those benchmarks would be drawn into a system of escalating consequences, designed to push them back into compliance rather than to penalise them all at once.
The penalties would begin with a 12-month course aimed at getting a failing institution back on track, funded by the institutions themselves, and could ultimately extend to the loss of their right to bring in international students. For some colleges and universities that final step could be financially devastating, given how heavily many of them rely on overseas student fees as part of their income.
Minister Mike Tapp insisted the measures were not about shutting the door on overseas students. He said there was nothing wrong with international students coming to Britain, that he celebrated it, and that the students he had met were studying in fields such as artificial intelligence and science that the country needed. At the same time, he said the immigration system had to be controlled and compliant so that it was not being abused by people arriving on study or work visas only to then claim asylum.
Tapp argued that an asylum claim had to come from those genuinely fleeing war and persecution, and that such people needed to lodge their claim as an asylum seeker rather than as a student or a worker. He said the government had already had success in tackling the issue but wanted to go further. From next year a traffic light system is also to be introduced, with green signalling that an institution is meeting its targets, amber warning that it is in danger and red marking those that are failing, in order to provide transparency for the public.
John Vine, the former Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration, told GB News the practice had been around for many years. He explained that institutions such as universities and colleges have to sponsor students in order for them to obtain a visa to come to the UK and study, and that the process had traditionally been quite rigorous. He said it was good to see the government recognising the problem, while warning that rules which were enforced rigorously some years ago appeared to have lapsed.
Vine said that students from certain Asian countries, with those from Pakistan among the worst offenders in his account, were coming to Britain, claiming asylum and not attending their courses, which he described as bad both for the universities and for the country. He argued that for an institution this represented a threat to its income stream, and said there should not be 10,000 people in the country on a visa who are claiming asylum. He added that the Home Office already had powers to penalise universities for non-attendance, and that there should be a regime within each organisation to draw such cases to the attention of management.