Asked by: Calvin Bailey (Labour - Leyton and Wanstead)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when her Department plans to launch its consultation on settlement policy.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
We will be consulting on the new settlement rules later this year. Following that, we will provide details of how this initiative will work.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Wyre)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many social workers are working in the UK on a (a) skilled workers visa and (b) health and care visa.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes data on sponsored work visas by occupation in the ‘Immigration System Statistics Quarterly Release. Data on grants of visas are published in table ‘Occ_D02’ of the ‘sponsored work visas by occupation and industry dataset. Information on how to use the dataset can be found in the ‘Notes’ page of the workbook. Data is from January 2021 up to the end of June 2025.
Asked by: Victoria Collins (Liberal Democrat - Harpenden and Berkhamsted)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to support Palestinian students from Gaza who have been accepted onto UK university courses with (a) access to secure (i) English language testing (ii) visa processing and (b) other (A) administrative, (B) financial and (C) logistical travel requirements.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government has outlined plans to support the departure from Gaza of a group of Chevening Scholars so they can take up university places in the UK in the Autumn for the 2025/26 academic year. We are extending this support to students in Gaza with full scholarships, meaning students who have their course fees and living costs fully funded by an official sponsor, as specified in the Immigration Rules.
For further information, please see the policy papers published by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office and the Department for Education, on 14 September 2025 and 15 September 2025 respectively, on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Wyre)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for what reason she decided to use NHS pay bands instead of local authority pay bands when determining income requirements for overseas social workers applying for a skilled workers visa.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
We use Office for National Statistics (ONS) data to set salary requirements for occupations, except where a national pay scale exists. In the case of social workers, the NHS Agenda for Change is the only available national scale, as Local Authority rates vary. Using Agenda for Change means the salary requirements are lower than they would be if we used ONS data.
On 2 July we asked the independent Migration Advisory Committee to advise on future salary requirements for Skilled Worker visas. We look forward to receiving their recommendations in due course.
Asked by: Kate Osamor (Labour (Co-op) - Edmonton and Winchmore Hill)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent estimate her Department has made of the number of British citizen children living in households subject to No Recourse to Public Funds.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) condition applies to the vast majority of adult temporary migrants in the UK and those without legal status, many of whom may not be in touch with the Home Office. Data on the children within migrant families is not routinely collected. However, the Home Office regularly engages with stakeholders via the NRPF forum which provides a platform to raise concerns and share experiences of those affected by the policy.
Asked by: Claire Hanna (Social Democratic & Labour Party - Belfast South and Mid Down)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when the Labour Market Evidence Group plans to visit Northern Ireland to consult local businesses.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Labour Market Evidence Group (LMEG) is supporting the UK Government’s aim to rebalance UK labour market away from an over-reliance on international recruitment and towards domestic workers and ensuring that growth-driving sectors have access to the skilled workers they need now and into the future. LMEG has been established and is meeting regularly at working level with the first formal meeting of LMEG taking place on 29th July 2025. That meeting contained representatives from:
At the first meeting LMEG members agreed a workplan in collaboration with Devolved Governments including Northern Ireland Executive. This workplan will support LMEG’s ambition, as set out in the Immigration White Paper, of working together to gather and share evidence about the state of the workforce, training levels and participation in the domestic labour market, including at Devolved Government and regional levels.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a separate immigration desk system at the UK border for people who (a) live and work in the UK and (b) do not hold a UK passport.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
There are no proposed changes to airport queuing arrangements for any cohorts, including for non-British citizens who live and work in the UK, at the current time. We keep this under review to prioritise security, maintain fluidity and ensure we continue to run our border in the best interests of the UK whilst also considering capacity and availability of space at individual ports.
As set out in our Immigration White Paper, published May 2025, we are now moving to the next phase in our vision to revolutionise the UK border by using technology to make visible changes to security, flow and the passenger experience. We aim to do this through the piloting of new innovative technologies later this year and by continuing to explore options to expand the use of automation and eGates to more cohorts.
Asked by: Ben Goldsborough (Labour - South Norfolk)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the proposed changes to the Skilled Workers visa route on recruitment in (a) the biological sciences research sector, (b) universities and (c) the NHS.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
On 12 May, we published our Immigration White Paper, outlining our future approach to legal migration routes. We have now made Immigration Rules changes to bring the first of these reforms into effect.
It is our intention to publish an Impact Assessment (IA) at the earliest opportunity. A technical annex (www.gov.uk/government/publications/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-white-paper/restoring-control-over-the-immigration-system-technical-annex) was published alongside the Immigration White Paper setting out the impact of some of the key policy changes.
Asked by: Tim Farron (Liberal Democrat - Westmorland and Lonsdale)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many unaccompanied children were granted refugee family reunion visas in the year ending 30 June 2025.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes data on refugee family reunion in the 'Immigration System Statistics Quarterly Release'. Data on refugee family reunion visa grants, by age group, is published in table Fam_D01 of the 'family reunion visa grants detailed datasets'. The latest data relate to June 2025.
In the year ending June 2025 11,641 children under the age of 18 were granted a family reunion visa - this figure includes both accompanied and unaccompanied children.
We do not publish data for the number of unaccompanied children who have been granted family reunion visas. Official statistics published by the Home Office are kept under review in line with the code of practice for statistics, taking into account a number of factors including user needs, the resources required to compile the statistics, as well as quality and availability of data.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps her Department has taken to ensure the security of data submitted by third parties in support of visa applications.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
UK Visa and Immigration’s commercial partners provide administrative services on behalf of the UK Government to support in processing visa applications. The UK Government visa decision making systems are entirely separate from commercial partner solutions.
Information provided by visa customers in support of their application is captured by UKVI’s commercial partner, and this information is encrypted and securely transmitted to UKVI and subsequently deleted from commercial partner systems.
UKVI works closely with its partners to ensure security of personal data and that this is handled in line with UK data protection requirements. UKVI’s Commercial Partners are certified to ISO 27001:2022 and accredited with UKVI Cyber Essentials Plus, ensuring compliance with the highest benchmarks for information protection. UKVI also ensure that its Commercial Partners undertake periodic third-party assessments to provide independent assurance on the security measures implemented.