Jonathan Gullis
Main Page: Jonathan Gullis (Conservative - Stoke-on-Trent North)Department Debates - View all Jonathan Gullis's debates with the Home Office
(12 months ago)
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Robert Jenrick
I am very happy to look into the case with the hon. Lady. As a general rule, we believe migration should not be the first lever we pull in the event of humanitarian crises. We should be using the UK’s diplomatic muscle, our overseas development aid, as the primary way in which the UK can have the greatest impact in the world, but there are always cases where we make exceptions.
Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)
Last week’s net migration figures were completely unacceptable to the people of Stoke-on-Trent North, Kidsgrove and Talke, which is why the New Conservatives, helpfully, have a 12-point plan that the Minister for Immigration could copy and paste to ensure we get those figures down. Will he extend the closure of the student dependant route to students enrolled on a one-year research master’s degree?
Robert Jenrick
First, we believe that the level of legal migration into this country is far too high. That has very profound impacts on access to public services, the productivity of our economy, and the ability of the UK to be a socially cohesive and united country. That is why we need to take action. We have already announced a specific policy with respect to dependants, which comes into force at the beginning of next year. We think it will have a substantive impact on the levels of net migration, but, as the Prime Minister said, we are keeping all options under review and will take further action as required.