Earned Settlement - how will the planned changes to ILR affect you?

• 10 years becomes the default for most people on work and family routes.
• Faster routes for high earners and key workers. Earn over £125,141, or hold a Global Talent or Innovator Founder visa, and you could settle in three years. If you earn over £50,271, or work in an eligible health or education role (doctors, nurses, teachers and so on) or have a British family connection, you keep a five-year route.
• Slower routes for rule breakers. An immigration breach as an adult, such as overstaying, breaking your visa conditions or using deception, pushes settlement back to 20 years. If you’ve claimed public funds, you’ll need five continuous years off them before applying, or face the same 20-year wait.
• Tougher minimum standards for everyone (more on these below).
• A reprieve for care workers who arrived before May 2025, plus a second chance for those who fell short of their visa conditions.
• Much longer waits for many refugees: typically 10 to 20 years, and up to 30 for those who arrived illegally, such as by small boat.
• The 10-year Long Residence route will close, so time on Student, Graduate or Youth Mobility visas will no longer count towards settlement.

For many skilled workers, £50,271 is the number to watch. The general Skilled Worker salary threshold is well below it, so many sponsored workers who were on track for settlement after five years now face ten, unless their pay rises.

Whichever route you’re on, you’ll need to tick every one of these boxes:

• A clean criminal record. Any adult conviction will mean refusal, including a fine, a community sentence, a discharge or a conditional caution, not just prison. That could include something like shoplifting or a driving offence that went to court, such as driving without insurance. Refusal for these ‘lesser’ offences is currently discretionary; under the new rules it becomes automatic.
• No debts to the government, such as unpaid NHS charges, tax or Home Office costs.
• English at B2 level, up from B1, roughly A-level standard in a foreign language. This one already has a firm date: it applies to settlement applications made on or after 26 March 2027.
• A pass in the Life in the UK test.
• Sustained contribution: earnings of at least £12,571 a year in five of the last seven years on the standard route. Couples can pool their income to meet a household threshold of £25,142.

Care workers are the big winners compared with what was first proposed. Last year’s plan for a 15-year wait has been scrapped.

• Arrived before May 2025 and met your visa conditions? You keep your five-year route, provided you’ve earned at least £25,000 a year in social care and meet the new minimum standards, including B2 English. Around 280,000 care workers and dependants are expected to benefit.
• Fell short of your visa conditions? Around a quarter of those who came between 2022 and 2025 did, often because rogue sponsors had little or no work to offer. You’ll get a second chance: a further five-year care visa, not tied to your old employer, after which you can apply for settlement. In practice that means around ten years in total, but it’s a realistic path to staying.
• Arrived after May 2025? The transitional protection doesn’t apply, so the standard 10-year route will.

There’s extra protection too if your sponsor loses its licence. From 1 February 2027 you’ll have 120 days to find a new job offer and a further 60 days to sort out your visa. The same five-year protection also covers some lower-paid health and education workers, such as auxiliary nurses and teaching assistants, who arrived before May 2025.

The idea that partners and adult children would each have to earn settlement separately has been dropped, so families can generally settle together.

• Partners who arrive with you can settle at the same time, on the same route, as long as they meet the minimum requirements. A partner who joins later starts their own clock.
• Children under 18 settle with their parents and are exempt from the income, English and Life in the UK requirements.
• Young adults aged 18 to 24 can settle with the family but must meet the adult requirements, apart from the income test.
• Anyone aged 25 or over when the family qualifies will need to qualify on their own or switch to their own visa, a real risk for families facing a 10-year wait.

Several groups keep their current settlement arrangements, including Hong Kong BN(O) visa holders, the Armed Forces, the Windrush generation, the Afghan schemes, EU Settlement Scheme holders, bereaved partners and victims of domestic abuse. Partners and children of British citizens also keep a five-year route. Most of these groups will still need to meet the tougher criminality and English rules, though.

After Brexit, Boris Johnson’s government introduced a new points-based system just as Covid hit and social care faced a staffing crisis. The care route was opened up, businesses were encouraged to sponsor overseas staff, and net migration soared to well over 700,000 a year. This surge has since been dubbed the ‘Boris Wave’.

According to the Home Secretary, 250,000 people, plus their dependants, came on or switched into the care route between 2022 and 2025. Many did exactly what was asked of them, but the route was also badly abused, and around 1,800 sponsors have since lost their licences. Those early arrivals are now reaching the five-year mark, which is why the government has acted now.

Then there’s the politics. Reform UK surged in the polls on the back of immigration, with Nigel Farage proposing to scrap ILR altogether. Public anger has mostly been about small boats, but it has spilled over into every corner of the system, catching up people who came lawfully, filled skills gaps and paid their taxes.

When Mahmood first trailed these plans last year, many in her own party pushed back. More than 100 Labour MPs urged a rethink, and Angela Rayner (then on the back benches, now Housing Secretary) called moving the goalposts for people already here ‘un-British’. The plans have since been softened, but many still feel they’re unfair.

Challenged in the Commons, Mahmood said it’s the government’s job to set the rules and adapt them. Settlement is decided under the rules at the time of the decision, a principle tested in the courts, and the move to ten years has been public since the May 2025 Immigration White Paper. She also argued the post-Covid influx of care workers came through a route left open to abuse, a marriage in haste that was never repented at leisure by the then Tory government.

Even so, many migrants and their MPs will feel the goalposts have been moved. Plenty of skilled workers arrived expecting to settle after five years and now face ten, while paying visa fees and the Immigration Health Surcharge all the way.

The Home Office estimates that over 500,000 people will now become eligible to settle later than they would have. Its own illustrative figures for those expected to settle between 2026 and 2030 include:

• around 231,000 Skilled Workers and dependants moving onto the 10-year route
• around 100,000 care workers and dependants who don’t meet their visa conditions and will need a further visa
• around 39,000 people on family visas not sponsored by a British citizen
• around 136,000 refugees and dependants, most of whom will wait at least ten years

A full impact assessment will follow as the rules are rolled out.

Not yet. This is confirmed government policy, but the new qualifying periods aren’t in force. Mahmood says the changes will start to appear in the December Immigration Rules and be rolled out over 2027. There’s no firm start date for the 10-year rule, but the B2 English change kicks in on 26 March 2027.

That matters. If you qualify under today’s rules, there may be a window to apply before the new ones arrive.

There’s still a lot we don’t know, particularly around dependants, public funds and exactly when the new rules will start.

But if you or your family are eligible for ILR now, or will be soon, it makes sense to explore your options before the goalposts move, because very soon the goal line may be pushed further out of reach. It’s also worth checking whether your visa route counts towards settlement, how your earnings compare with the new thresholds, and whether your English is at B2 level.

We’re here to help. Give us a call or send us a message, and we’ll advise you on the best course of action.