Mahmood's '£10billion migrant climbdown': Home Secretary abandons tougher residency rules after backbench revolt

Shabana Mahmood last night watered down plans for tougher immigration rules in the wake of a Labour Party revolt.

Almost 300,000 foreign care workers will be exempted from a crackdown which would have seen them waiting years longer to win permanent status in Britain.

A series of massive concessions to Labour MPs who opposed the Home Secretary's original plan mean that out of 1.9million foreign nationals due to become eligible for settlement by 2030, only 500,000 will end up waiting longer. 

Critics said the climbdown could cost taxpayers £10billion in lifetime costs for welfare handouts and other public spending such as the NHS.

The leader of Britain's biggest trade union, Unison, crowed that it had 'led the charge' in forcing Ms Mahmood to cave in after unions and 100 backbench MPs waged a campaign against the tougher initial proposals. 

Ms Mahmood also came up against opposition in Cabinet, with Housing Secretary Angela Rayner and Energy Secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh both critical.

Under the new measures, about three-quarters of foreign care workers who arrived here in the post-pandemic immigration wave – more than 282,000 people – will remain on a five-year qualification period for settlement, or 'indefinite leave to remain' (ILR), down from a proposed 15 years when the measures were unveiled 12 months ago.

Having ILR enables people to live, work and claim benefits for the rest of their life. Those who do not qualify for such status after living here for five years will instead be given a new five-year visa and a 'second chance' to meet the criteria for permanent residence.

Shabana Mahmood last night watered down plans for tougher immigration rules in the wake of a Labour Party revolt (file image)

The new package also lowers ILR waiting times for other types of workers, as well as some who arrived in Britain as asylum seekers. Ms Mahmood said: 'Settled status is one of the most valuable rights this country can offer.

'Until now it has been given almost automatically. From today it must be earned.

'Those who contribute most will settle fastest. Those who don't play by the rules will be refused or wait much longer.'

But Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp accused her of 'a substantial climbdown on their previous ILR policy under pressure from the open-borders Left'.

He said: 'Over 250,000 low-wage care workers and dependants – even ones who came fraudulently – will now get to stay for at least ten years, and 75 per cent of them can now stay for ever.

'The Government's own figures show the cost of this to taxpayers is £10billion.

'This is completely unfair to hard-pressed taxpayers.'

He added: 'The Government also said that illegal immigrants will have a path to citizenship and full benefits.

Writing in today's Daily Mail, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said Ms Mahmood had been 'humiliated' (file image)

'My view is that illegal immigrants should never get citizenship.'

Writing in today's Daily Mail, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said Ms Mahmood had been 'humiliated'. She wrote: 'She wanted to make people wait longer before they could settle permanently in Britain and access benefits. A perfectly reasonable principle and one which we would have supported.

'But Angela Rayner and the Left flank of Labour backbenchers didn't like it, so they are preparing to exempt care workers already here.'

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage branded it 'the beginning of the capitulation', adding: 'That it is a very major U-turn in the position of the Home Secretary is clear. That it will cost this country a vast amount of money is clear.'

The existing five-year ILR route will remain available for other foreign nationals employed in public sector jobs that require lower qualifications, such as teaching assistants, podiatrists and nursing auxiliaries.

Other workers in lower-qualified jobs will no longer have to wait 15 years for ILR – as previously set out by Ms Mahmood – and could instead qualify in ten years.

It comes just months after Ms Mahmood warned that a failure to implement her original blueprint, published last November, would lead to a '£10billion drain on public finances'.

She had insisted that diluting the proposals would be 'an affront to the idea of fairness within our society', while putting 'further strain on public services like housing and healthcare'.

Last night officials said the £10billion referred to by Ms Mahmood was out of date, and 'a few billion' in welfare payments would be saved by yesterday's changes.

Ms Rayner castigated the reforms as 'un-British' in March when she was a backbencher. Last month Ms Fahnbulleh refused to say she backed the proposals. In a now removed post on her constituency website, she criticised the plans, warning that a longer wait for settlement would 'prolong the process of building cohesion'.

Mr Philp said: 'A Home Office document, which (Ms Mahmood) published on March 5, said that social care workers alone, because they work on lower wages and have brought in many dependants, will actually cost the taxpayer £10billion.

'And outside of care workers, many of the so-called highly skilled workers recently arrived are not highly skilled at all,' he added, listing three restaurant companies which he said had sponsored a combined 212 skilled worker visas. 

'You get the picture,' he continued. 'And just a year after getting (indefinite leave to remain), someone can easily get full citizenship and we know what that means – benefits, social housing and free NHS (care).'

Some Labour backbenchers, however, voiced opposition even to the watered-down measures.

Veteran MP Diane Abbott dubbed the reforms 'unfair' and compared them to the Windrush scandal. Ex-Corbynite shadow chancellor John McDonnell questioned increased settlement times of up to 30 years for small-boat migrants. MP Rachael Maskell described the changes as 'prejudicial'.

The general secretary of Labour-supporting Unison, Andrea Egan, said her union had played a key role in the climbdown, adding: 'We are glad (Ms Mahmood) has finally listened to us and not implemented the worst aspects.'

• READ MORE: Just a quarter of arrivals will have to wait longer for leave to remain, Mahmood reveals in her watered-down plans 
• READ MORE: Four in five people who took the Home Office's immigration poll were NOT British, figures show  
•  QUENTIN LETTS: Shabana Mahmood didn't so much deliver her speech as pebble-dash it at her audience