Student Visas

Lord Wallace of Saltaire Excerpts

Thursday 25th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Migration and Borders (Lord Murray of Blidworth) (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for that question. The numbers are these. In March 2023, 477,931 sponsored study visas were granted to main applicants, which was 22% more than in March 2022. In the year ending March 2023, almost one-quarter, 24%, of all sponsored study-related visas granted were to dependants of students—149,400—compared with 15% in the year ending March 2022. Our indication is that 88% of those dependant visas were to those undertaking taught postgraduate courses, so the rule changes will have the effect of greatly reducing the availability of the dependency visas to those who might otherwise have used them, and therefore reduce the net intake.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as someone who used to run the research side of the international relations department at the LSE. We had well over 50 research students while I was there. To my knowledge, all but one returned to their country of origin, or went elsewhere, after completion of their studies, and the one who remained, an Indian, is now teaching in a senior position in a British university. Is this a real problem, or is it part of the muddle of our migration statistics? Should we not be separating students who come here for either one or three years as temporary migrants and distinguish them from permanent migrants? The problem of our current migration statistics is that they lump everyone together, which as a result makes the whole problem look worse than it is.

[Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)]

I am afraid that I must disagree with the noble Lord: it is a real problem, for the reasons I have just read out to the Chamber, with the statistics demonstrating the increase in dependants attending, in particular those from two countries. The numbers are startling and required action to change the rules, and I am very grateful for the support from the Official Opposition in doing that.