Former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner branded the plans “un-British” in a speech on Tuesday night.
LONDON — The U.K. government is considering substantial compromises on its plan to make it harder for migrants to permanently settle in Britain, following a backlash from Labour MPs.
Downing Street declined to guarantee on Wednesday that proposals to significantly extend the length of time migrants must wait for permanent residence would proceed as planned.
Angela Rayner, a frontrunner to succeed struggling Prime Minister Keir Starmer, made a major intervention on the issue Tuesday night, intensifying the existing pressure to change tack from MPs in Starmer’s center-left party.
Rayner, his former deputy PM, branded the plans “bad policy,” a “breach of trust” and “un-British” in a speech.
The government issued a statement on Wednesday backing the broad policy of increasing the standard route to settlement from five to ten years. But officials reiterated that they were looking at transitional arrangements for migrants already in the U.K. — suggesting that not all proposals would apply retroactively.
That would address concern from Rayner and other critics that the government is “moving the goalposts” — but also be a major headache for the Home Office, which is facing the consequences of a surge in legal migration after Brexit.
One senior minister, granted anonymity to discuss internal conversations, said one potential compromise was to introduce more routes for migrants to obtain indefinite leave to remain (ILR) in a shorter timeframe.
They told POLITICO that the proposals had been “shifting anyway” before Rayner’s intervention.
“No. 10 and the chief whip are heavily engaged with MPs, in a way that they weren’t with the welfare reforms,” they added.
Critics have complained that lower-earning migrants will have to wait far longer than high earners before being granted settlement under the government’s proposed changes.
Tony Vaughan, the backbench leader of a push to get Starmer to rethink the plans, told the same event that Rayner spoke at: “We cannot have a system where the child of a banker gets settlement after three years and the child of a care worker gets it after 15.”
On Wednesday, officials came under intense pressure to back Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s plans. By the afternoon, the government released a statement insisting it would “double the route to settlement from five to ten years,” but added that “we are consulting to apply this change to those [who are] in the U.K. today but have not received settled status.”
That consultation — which the government says has received 200,000 responses — gives ministers wriggle-room to water down their proposals.
But if the changes aren’t applied retroactively, it risks undermining the argument that they are being introduced to target the so-called “Boriswave,” a nickname for the significant spike in migrants arriving in the U.K. following COVID lockdowns under former Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson. These people are due to start receiving settled status shortly.
‘Open for discussion’
Mahmood’s proposals are being dispersed through various pieces of legislation — making a fightback against them harder for critics. The ILR restrictions will be made via a rule change that doesn’t require legislation at all. But some Labour opponents asked whether that position is sustainable.
“The big question is if politically they can do that even if they can legally,” said one Rayner ally. “The one thing that appears to unite a growing body of people is a blunt retrospective five to ten year element, with no protections.”
The opponents hope they can get the PM to water the plans down himself, but failing that, they want to push for a vote. They’re yet to land on a means, but tabling an amendment to one element of the legislation is one possibility under discussion, one adviser told POLITICO.
Like other critics, the same adviser had been buoyed by Rayner’s speech: “That was very helpful last night. That was a big intervention.”
Vaughan, an immigration lawyer at the firm where Starmer practised, Doughty Street Chambers, has written a detailed letter to the PM calling for a rethink that has amassed more than 100 signatures from fellow Labour MPs.
One government official said: “They’re doing an awful lot of engagement with MPs. It’s been going on for weeks. I hadn’t heard that they were willing to shift, but I’ve noticed that they’ve been doing loads of engagement. Anyone who wants to talk to a minister is being put in front of one, and anything on the proposals that have been floated has been open for discussion.”
Mahmood, however, thinks her plans are popular with the wider public. Her team points to research by the More in Common think tank that suggests extending the waiting period for ILR, even if applied to those already living in the U.K., is backed by Green supporters on the left of British politics.
A leadership pitch?
Rayner’s comments on the migration proposals were part of a broader swipe at the direction and strategy of Starmer’s government, from which she resigned over a tax scandal in September. She said her party was “running out of time” to show change and “cannot just go through the motions in the face of decline.”
Some of Rayner’s supporters — and critics — in Labour suggested privately that her intervention was geared toward winning the support of grassroots members in any future leadership contest.
Leadership contenders generally require some support from major unions, which are formally affiliated to Labour. One of the largest, UNISON, branded the migration reforms “reckless” in February.
One union official said: “Rayner’s intervention on changes to indefinite leave to remain is savvy. It’s one of UNISON’s big campaign asks right now — UNISON represents a lot of migrant social care workers. Rayner coming out publicly against Mahmood’s proposals won’t go unnoticed.”
The left-wing TSSA union, which has already publicly backed Rayner to replace Starmer, praised her “sound advice” on Wednesday while Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester mayor who had been touted as a possible leadership contender before he was blocked from running for parliament, said Rayner “needs to be listened to.”
A second union official said: “She’s playing a canny game, the way she’s got the unions and Burnham on her side over this. She’s making clear that she is the default candidate.”