Dear Minister, may I ask whether it could be considered to refund the Super Priority service fee, as I did not receive the expedited decision that the service is intended to provide.
Dear Minister,
May I kindly ask the Home Office Minister what measures he is taking to reduce the UK labour market’s structural dependence on migrant workers — so that Voters' frustration about irregular migration are not addressed at the expense of lawful migrants who work, contribute, and pay taxes regularly.
What assessment has he made of the prolonged delays affecting ECAA Turkish Businessperson visa holders @ecaavisaowners — a route closed to new applicants for five years and contributing zero to net migration — including cases where second‑extension applications have been on hold since September 2025, compelling circumstances have been submitted twice, yet the case was assigned to a caseworker only after eight months, and applicants have been told of ‘unexpectedly high volumes’ despite the route’s very small and declining caseload just few thousands.
What assessment has he made of cases in which applicants, after waiting eight months, sought to vary to ILR with their children and attempted to obtain a next‑day decision for a spouse who is legally employed, despite paying NIC s/he had to pay also the IHS and Super Priority fee, but instead received only a £1,000 apology and were told that no decision could be made due to ‘complex issues’, with no refund, no explanation, and no deadline.
And in light of the visa brake introduced in March 2026 — which restricts outside the UK Student visa applications for nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan, and Skilled Worker applications for Afghan nationals, while still permitting inside the UK extensions and switching — what justification is there for leaving inside the UK ECAA applicants and their families, whose business plans have already been scrutinised twice in five years, in open‑ended uncertainty, with cases labelled ‘complex’ or ‘not straightforward’, and with no explanation, no timeline, and no service standard.
And what consideration has the Minister given to the position of UK‑taxpaying lawful migrant families earning £30,000 to £50,000 a year — families who are neither on welfare nor wealthy — who are nevertheless treated as if they were overseas parents sending their children to study in the UK, and therefore required to pay international university fees of around £30,000 per year, creating a prohibitive barrier for households that are fully self‑sufficient and contributing to the UK economy. For five years, these children have been cut off from their dreams — and now they are being confronted with a further five‑year barrier blocking their path to higher education.
Thank you Minister.
Sincerely.
@PutneyFleur@UKLabour@LibDems@Conservatives@LordsJHACom
https://t.co/E9yz5Wi2bh
Dear Minister,
May I kindly ask the Home Office Minister what measures he is taking to reduce the UK labour market’s structural dependence on migrant workers — so that Voters' frustration about irregular migration are not addressed at the expense of lawful migrants who work, contribute, and pay taxes regularly.
What assessment has he made of the prolonged delays affecting ECAA Turkish Businessperson visa holders @ecaavisaowners — a route closed to new applicants for five years and contributing zero to net migration — including cases where second‑extension applications have been on hold since September 2025, compelling circumstances have been submitted twice, yet the case was assigned to a caseworker only after eight months, and applicants have been told of ‘unexpectedly high volumes’ despite the route’s very small and declining caseload just few thousands.
What assessment has he made of cases in which applicants, after waiting eight months, sought to vary to ILR with their children and attempted to obtain a next‑day decision for a spouse who is legally employed, despite paying NIC s/he had to pay also the IHS and Super Priority fee, but instead received only a £1,000 apology and were told that no decision could be made due to ‘complex issues’, with no refund, no explanation, and no deadline.
And in light of the visa brake introduced in March 2026 — which restricts outside the UK Student visa applications for nationals of Afghanistan, Cameroon, Myanmar and Sudan, and Skilled Worker applications for Afghan nationals, while still permitting inside the UK extensions and switching — what justification is there for leaving inside the UK ECAA applicants and their families, whose business plans have already been scrutinised twice in five years, in open‑ended uncertainty, with cases labelled ‘complex’ or ‘not straightforward’, and with no explanation, no timeline, and no service standard.
And what consideration has the Minister given to the position of UK‑taxpaying lawful migrant families earning £30,000 to £50,000 a year — families who are neither on welfare nor wealthy — who are nevertheless treated as if they were overseas parents sending their children to study in the UK, and therefore required to pay international university fees of around £30,000 per year, creating a prohibitive barrier for households that are fully self‑sufficient and contributing to the UK economy. For five years, these children have been cut off from their dreams — and now they are being confronted with a further five‑year barrier blocking their path to higher education.
Thank you Minister.
Sincerely.
@PutneyFleur@UKLabour@LibDems@Conservatives@LordsJHACom
https://t.co/E9yz5Wi2bh
Yes, settlement in the UK is a privilege,
but a child’s access to higher education is a basic human right — one that should not depend on their parents’ visa category or on Home Office processing timelines.
Home Fee Status and Student Finance were based solely on the established requirement of three years of ordinary residence before the first day of the academic year. This applied even to British citizens living abroad; the rule was clear and fair.
Moreover, a child cannot obtain ILR unless the parent first obtains ILR. This creates a structural barrier that did not previously exist.
Therefore we demand the reinstatement of home‑fee status for every child in the UK, together with the restoration of their ability to apply for Student Finance — retrospectively applied from 31 December 2020 onwards.
Yes, we can see that changes can be applied retrospectively nowadays, so this too is possible.
Dear Bridget Phillipson @bphillipsonMP
As parents who live in the UK, work here, and pay taxes here, we find it difficult to understand how, after Brexit, UK‑resident families are required to pay international student fees for their children, while young people from EU countries can still come to UK universities under Erasmus arrangements and pay the same fees they would pay in their home countries.
If the Earned Settlement proposal results in extending the ILR route from five years to ten, then children who reach university age between 2021 and 2031 — whose parents have not yet been granted ILR — will also be required to pay international fees. It is hard to see how this could be considered a fairer system.
When one government department introduces major changes to the immigration system, was there no intervention from the department responsible for education to say that children’s equal access to higher education should not be compromised?
Section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 imposes a clear statutory duty: Every immigration decision must safeguard and promote the best interests of children in the UK. This is not a procedural formality but a legal duty requiring the government to prioritise children’s physical, emotional, and educational wellbeing in every action it takes.
This duty also incorporates the UK’s obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into domestic law, requiring that a child’s best interests be a primary consideration in all decisions (Article 3 UNCRC).
Give children back their Home Student fee status and their right to apply for Student Finance, retrospectively from 1 January 2021.
@ecaavisaowners
#ProtectECAA #FairImmigration
#ecaavisa #ankaraagreement
Earned Settlement may risk a London exodus
London now has around 3.8M homes — yet the city’s demographic balance is shifting fast, with 40% of residents born outside the UK and post‑2021 migration patterns reshaping demand.
Since 2021, over 1M skilled/work‑route migrants arrived to plug labour gaps — an estimated 300–400K settled in London — but collapsing net migration (down to 204K) and rising non‑EU departures signal a turning tide.
If ILR moves from 5 to 10 years from April 2026, tens of thousands of mid‑tier workers may simply leave rather than wait a decade — accelerating an outflow already visible in the data.
Rental demand in London is down ~20% YoY (Zoopla Dec 2025), supply is up (6% in London), and rents are stagnating or falling — with overall London growth at just 1.6% while Inner London sees declines of up to –5.8% (Hamptons 2025). The migration‑fuelled rental boom is clearly unwinding.
As more renters exit and landlords sell at a loss
-14.8% of London homes sold below purchase price in 2025 — a record high, driven by flats, the middle of the market faces real downward pressure — and the speculative era looks over.
Is this the right moment to push it?
Has Earned Settlement’s housing impact been studied?
@AngelaRayner@mtpennycook@SharonStevenage@sianberry@lisanandy@michaelgove@CarolineLucas@AnnelieseDodds@bphillipsonMP@munirawilson@LauraTrottMP@KemiBadenoch@ClaireCoutinho@ShabanaMahmood@tonyvaughanMP@PaulKohlerSW19@carolinenokes@labourlewis@SirRogerGale@sarahjolney1@FeryalClark@OllyGloverLD@labourpress@UKLabour@LibDems@Conservatives@UniversitiesUK@UUKIntl@LabourList@EmmaBurnell_@Hamptons1869 @ecaavisowners
https://t.co/79WQC8SfNn
Dear @helenmaguiremp
Thank you sincerely for giving a voice to the concerns of the ECAA community. A route that is not points‑based, and that—like the EUSS—is a closed, legacy, treaty‑based category, will not impose any additional burden on the UK’s net migration figures or on the State simply by allowing the few remaining visa holders to complete their ILR process.
The Government’s Explanatory Memorandum to HC 813 (para 2.15) made a clear and unambiguous commitment:
“Appendix ECAA Extension of Stay will largely replicate the existing ECAA arrangements to ensure that Turkish workers, businesspersons and their family members remain subject to the same eligibility requirements as now.”
The ECAA route is retrospective, static, “hard-coded” into the Rules on 31 December 2020 solely to honour the legitimate expectations of those already present. Families made long term life decisions—including business investments, property commitments, and children’s education—explicitly relying on the assurance that existing eligibility rules would continue to apply.
University fee status determinations and student finance decisions that now disregard these preserved rights contradict the Government’s stated intent and undermine the principle of legitimate expectation.
There is no evidence that removing the 5‑year settlement route for few remaining ECAA applicants would advance the Earned Settlement's objectives of reducing migration inflows. It cannot apply to the ECAA route, as it does not generate inflows, nor does applying these changes produce any measurable benefit.
In the absence of any evidence that applying Earned Settlement changes to ECAA would reduce net migration, the asserted public interest cannot outweigh the reliance interests at stake.
In the absence of such justification, departing from the 2020 promise would risk being characterised as “conspicuous unfairness”.
For this reason,
👉🏻The university home fee entitlements of ECAA families cannot be altered from the position that applied before 31 December 2020.
👉🏻The State,
📌cannot retrospectively tighten conditions affecting children’s education rights, including home fee eligibility and access to Student Finance.
📌cannot permit the introduction of new barriers that undermine the settled and legitimate expectations of families.
International fees create a prohibitive barrier for families who are fully self sufficient and contributing to the UK economy. For many households, covering international fee levels necessitates an additional gross income of ca.£30,000 per year, even in the absence of any other expenses, a figure that is unrealistic even for higher earning taxpayers, such as a CEO — with a going‑rate salary of £88,100 gross, ca.£62,000 net as set on https://t.co/JIpHkXsPOR.
As noted in the Home Affairs Committee Oral Evidence (HC 1409, 21 January 2026, p.22),
https://t.co/IqeUsZ1h5b
Expert testimony acknowledged the severe impact when children reach university age before their parents receive settlement. This problem was anticipated by Parliament itself, underscoring that its impact is both foreseeable and unreasonable under the preserved terms of the legacy routes such as ECAA Turkish Businessperson.
Prior to 1 January 2021, the established threshold was applied uniformly — including to British citizens returning from overseas — and required three years of ordinary residence before the first day of the academic year.
This was consistently recognised as the sole and sufficient criterion for home‑fee eligibility under the pre‑Brexit regulatory framework.
— Why, then, has a child’s right to access higher education changed?
— Whose child is being treated as the ‘other’?
— Why is it now dependent on time, on the parent’s visa category, or even on the Home Office’s SLA for processing that category?
Is University access an equal right for the "Gifted", or a "Gift for the privileged few"?
Section 55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 imposes a clear statutory duty: Every immigration decision must safeguard and promote the best interests of children in the UK. This is not a procedural formality but a legal duty requiring the government to prioritise children’s physical, emotional, and educational wellbeing in every action it takes.
This duty also incorporates the UK’s obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into domestic law, requiring that a child’s best interests be a primary consideration in all decisions (Article 3 UNCRC).
Give children back their Home Student fee status and their right to apply for Student Finance, retrospectively from 1 January 2021.
@wesstreeting@StuartAndrew@SKinnock@AshleyDalton_MP@AshleyDalton_MP@zubirahmed@karinsmyth@AngelaRayner@mtpennycook@SharonStevenage@sianberry@lisanandy@michaelgove@CarolineLucas@AnnelieseDodds@bphillipsonMP@munirawilson@LauraTrottMP@KemiBadenoch@ClaireCoutinho@ShabanaMahmood@tonyvaughanMP@PaulKohlerSW19@carolinenokes@labourlewis@SirRogerGale@sarahjolney1@OllyGloverLD@labourpress@UKLabour@LibDems@EdwardJDavey@Conservatives@UniversitiesUK@UUKIntl@LabourList@EmmaBurnell_@TulipSiddiq@dsnorthnorth@CMurrayLabour@PaulKohlerSW19
Dear @PaulKohlerSW19
We are proud to have you as our MP.
As an academic lawyer who believes in the rule of law, we have full confidence that you will listen to us and help ensure our voices are heard. More than 100 signatures for our petition have come from your constituency.
Following Brexit, the UK expressly preserved the settlement expectations of existing ECAA holders through a transitional arrangement in domestic immigration law.
Closed ECAA Route Leaves Only a Shrinking Group of Remaining Applicants
A transitional arrangement has already been put in place for ECAA holders since 2020, and their eligibility to apply for ILR has been preserved.
Why is a transitional period of a closed legacy route protected by UK laws that is already nearing its end being extended for another five years?
There is no public benefit in doing so; it does not harm the state, yet it creates an unnecessary administrative burden.
References:
Appendix ECAA Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) and Further Leave to Remain (FLR) Guidance, Version 6.0 (11 November 2025) p, 13, https://t.co/ULOVLiMCAb
Hansard, ‘EU Exit: International Arrangements (Volume 655: debated on Thursday 7 March 2019’, https://t.co/zAZHYaH5uf
You can find interviews with successful ECAA entrepreneurs here. Please hear our voice
https://t.co/79WQC8SfNn
@ecaavisaowners
please Hear Our Call and Share It Across Parliament
thank you ms Sezin for your support
We are confident that our MP @PaulKohlerSW19 and his office will not leave our concerns unanswered.
A Closed Legacy Visa Should Not Be Treated Like an Open Route
No sponsorship.
No benefits.
Built on long-term business commitment.
Based on real contribution, not dependency.
Self-funded from day one.
https://t.co/mwuOaBWYUF
Earned Settlement Delays Penalise Children and Undermine DEI Principles
The extended ILR timeline created by the earned‑settlement system has a disproportionate impact on children who grow up in the UK and reach university age while still classified as temporary migrants. Because they are not eligible for home‑student fees or student‑finance loans since 2021, these children face significantly higher tuition costs and are excluded from financial support available to their peers.
This problem didn’t start with Earned Settlement. After 2020, children growing up in the UK have already been pushed into disadvantage — and the new system makes it even worse.
Before 2021, three years of ordinary residence before the first day of the academic year was enough.
So What Has Actually Changed? Same Child. Same Right.
Diversity is undermined when children who have lived most of their lives in the UK are priced out of higher education.
Equity is violated because these young people are not given fair access to the same opportunities as their classmates, despite sharing the same schools, communities and aspirations.
Inclusion is compromised when a policy structurally excludes a specific group from progressing into higher education simply due to an extended immigration route they cannot control.
A Future of Belonging Requires Fair Opportunity Today
In practice, the Earned Settlement delays create a systemic barrier that punishes children for their parents’ immigration category, not their own merit. This is inconsistent with the UK’s stated commitment to DEI and with the principle that every young person should have an equal chance to pursue higher education.
No child should lose their future because of a policy they had no control over.
We call for fair, humane, and equitable settlement pathways that protect young people’s right to education.
@AnnelieseDodds@bphillipsonMP@munirawilson@KemiBadenoch@ClaireCoutinho@ShabanaMahmood@PaulKohlerSW19@carolinenokes@SirRogerGale@sarahjolney1@FeryalClark@OllyGloverLD@labourpress@UKLabour@LibDems@Conservatives@UKHouseofLords
https://t.co/SuPao2GZol
Assess the Household’s Total Contribution
Not every spouse or child is a burden on the system. There are spouses who work, produce, run businesses, create employment, and pay taxes.
Similarly, not all children are a burden from birth or primary school age. Some arrive after the age of 14 and attend private schools or universities. There are also responsible young people who work part‑time and support parents who struggle to pay international fees.
When applicants appeal, they are told that every case is different and that decisions are made on a case‑by‑case basis.
Then please continue doing exactly that — and look at the total household income and the taxes paid, including Limited Company Directors who pay VAT and corporation tax on what they earn through their own skills, and then they also pay dividend and income tax on what they take home.
@AnnelieseDodds@bphillipsonMP@munirawilson@KemiBadenoch@ClaireCoutinho@ShabanaMahmood@PaulKohlerSW19@carolinenokes@SirRogerGale@sarahjolney1@FeryalClark@OllyGloverLD@labourpress@UKLabour@LibDems@Conservatives@UKHouseofLords
https://t.co/KpsI04v1vL
ECAA is not like other visa routes.
No sponsorship.
No benefits.
Built on long-term business commitment.
Based on real contribution, not dependency.
Self-funded from day one.
A closed, legacy visa should not be treated like open routes.
Exclude ECAA from settlement changes!
ECAA businesspersons are self-employed entrepreneurs.
They run real UK businesses.
They pay taxes.
They create jobs.
They receive no public funds.
Exclude ECAA from settlement changes!
We held a small meeting on Saturday, 3 January to discuss our roadmap for excluding ECAA from settlement changes.
We also conducted an interview with ECAA visa holder Sevcan Asilkan, a computer engineer and entrepreneur.
ECAA matters to the UK because it delivers real value.
It supports local economies.
It strengthens SMEs.
It encourages long-term investment.
It creates jobs.
It pays UK taxes.
This is economic contribution in action.
Exclude ECAA from settlement changes!
Sevcan Asilkan came to the UK under the ECAA Turkish Businessperson visa.
She and her family contribute to the UK economy and social life and are an asset to the UK.
Read more:
https://t.co/U2VbpFSsoo
#ukimmigration#ecaavisa#ankaraanlasmasi
Sevcan Asilkan explains why she chose the UK, came under the ECAA visa, and how she and her family contribute to the UK economy and society.
Read more:
https://t.co/U2VbpFSsoo
#ukimmigration#ecaavisa#ankaraanlasmasi
ECAA business owners run real UK businesses — cafés, restaurants, shops, tech companies, agencies, construction firms, and service businesses.
They create jobs, pay taxes, and contribute to the UK economy every day.
Exclude ECAA from settlement changes!
#ukimmigration#ecaavisa
Our interview series begins with Sevcan Asilkan, a computer engineer and entrepreneur.
She and her family contribute to the UK economy and social life and are an asset to the UK.
Read the full interview:
https://t.co/U2VbpFSsoo
#ukimmigration#ecaavisa#ankaraanlasmasi
A closed visa route cannot fix today’s migration challenges.
Sevcan Asilkan explains why changing settlement rules for ECAA would not benefit the UK.
Read more:
https://t.co/U2VbpFSsoo
#ukimmigration#ecaavisa#ankaraanlasmasi