Immigration Reforms: Humanitarian Visa Routes

Steve Witherden Excerpts

Tuesday 25th November 2025 Westminster Hall

[Steve Witherden (Montgomeryshire and Glyndŵr) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Edward. I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (James Naish) for securing this important debate, which could not have come at a more pressing time following last week’s announcements.

These suggested reforms are unlikely to deter people from seeking asylum in the United Kingdom—however they arrive—nor will they assist in integrating asylum seekers and refugees into our communities. We hear Ministers speak frequently of the need for stronger integration and better community cohesion, but at the same time they are determined to posture as being tough on immigration. That inherent tension between the desire to appear hardline and the need to foster cohesion means that the Government’s approach is likely to fail and may well create more problems than it resolves.

The Government want refugees to contribute, yet having their status reviewed every two and a half years gives employers little incentive to offer stable employment. Equally, asylum seekers have the right to work only after waiting 12 months for a decision from the Home Office, and even then only in a limited set of roles. Once again, there is the appearance of being torn between professing an interest in integration and a desire to appear performatively cruel towards refugees and asylum seekers.

I welcome, in principle, any expansion of safe and legal routes. The introduction of tight caps suggests that the number of people who will actually benefit will be very small. The displaced talent mobility pilot, for instance, provided places for just 100 applicants. More troubling is the implication that only the exceptional, the talented and the skilled are deserving of refuge. That is not what the 1951 refugee convention says, and it is not a principle that any compassionate country should embrace. Refuge is a protection owed to people because they are fleeing persecution, not because they meet a labour market threshold.

In truth, the UK receives less than 1% of the world’s refugees; most remain in neighbouring countries. While the finger is pointed at migrants and asylum seekers, the reality is that working people have far more in common with an asylum seeker living on £49 a week than with a billionaire. The real threat does not come from those arriving in small boats but from those arriving on super-yachts. We should be tackling inequality and holding the super-rich to account, not scapegoating migrants.

[Sir Edward Leigh (in the Chair)]

I cannot comment on the content, but the delivery of the last speech was certainly very powerful.