Earned settlement: who pays for the ten-year wait?

What ten years means for a family

For a family, five extra years can be half a childhood.

Her visa depends on her sponsor for five more years. Changing job means a new sponsor and a new application, and if her employer loses its licence or she loses her job, she may have as little as 60 days to find a new sponsor or leave the UK.

There is no safety net in that time. People on a Skilled Worker visa cannot claim most benefits, so if she falls ill or is made redundant there is no Universal Credit to fall back on. Claiming public funds in the five years before applying would also push the family onto the 20-year path.

Her daughter may have to start again on her own. Under today’s rules she would settle with her parents at twenty. On the ten-year path she turns twenty-five just as the family qualifies, and anyone aged 25 or over by then must qualify independently. The government’s response accepts that this “will principally affect young adults whose family has not yet reached settlement by the time they turn 25, for example because the family is on a longer settlement pathway”.

University gets harder too. In England, students without settled status usually pay international tuition fees and cannot get student loans, unless they meet other residence rules. A ten-year wait can cover a child’s last years at school and all of university.

Citizenship moves further away. Most people can apply twelve months after settling, so ten years to settle means around eleven years to citizenship.

A single mistake can add another ten years. Overstaying or breaching visa conditions as an adult can put someone on the 20-year path. The list of breaches has not been published yet, so families will live with that risk without knowing its exact shape.

All of this costs more as well. At today’s fees, the extra five years add around £7,040 in visa fees and the Immigration Health Surcharge for one worker, and around £19,825 for a family of three. Most of that is the health surcharge, paid by people who already pay tax and National Insurance.

Who is in the middle

The government’s response is open about the numbers. It says that over 500,000 people expected to settle between 2026 and 2030 will now become eligible later than they would have. Among them are 146,000 Skilled Workers and 85,000 of their family members on the ten-year path, and around 50,000 care workers and 50,000 family members, a number the government itself calls uncertain.

These people work and pay tax. Most of them simply earn less than £50,271.

The line at £50,271

£50,271 is the point at which the higher rate of income tax starts in England. It is also well above what most people earn. ONS figures published last month put the median full-time salary at £40,911 across the UK and £38,628 in the West Midlands.

In the West Midlands, only around a quarter of full-time employees earn £50,271 or more. In London it is around half. The threshold is the same everywhere, so a worker in Birmingham is far less likely to reach the five-year path than a worker in London doing similar work.

The Migration Advisory Committee says the minimum Skilled Worker salary of £41,700 sits at the 30th percentile of pay in eligible graduate-level jobs, and the median is £52,500. On those figures, somewhere between 43% and half of pay in those jobs falls below the five-year line. Workers already here in jobs below degree level, such as chefs (typically £33,334) and butchers (£30,806), are further from it still.

The government says it heard this. Its summary of the consultation records “concerns about regional pay differences and the impact on lower-paid but socially valuable occupations”. I am not convinced the final framework answers them.

Credit where it is due

The government did listen on some points. The 15-year path for jobs below degree level has been dropped. Care workers who arrived before May 2025 keep a five-year route if they earn £25,000 and stay in genuine sponsored work. Health and education workers on national pay scales who arrived before May 2025 are protected, and Skilled Workers sponsored before April 2024 can keep extending on their current terms until 2035. Those changes will help many people.

But they protect specific groups. The government says plainly that there is no wider exemption for people already living here. The software tester who arrived in 2025, doing everything asked of her, is now on a ten-year path.

What I would ask

• Publish the full impact assessment before the new Immigration Rules are laid, so Parliament can see who is affected and where.
• Look again at a single national threshold. A five-year path that most workers outside London cannot reach is a regional policy in practice, whether or not it is meant to be.
• Count sustained contribution alongside salary. Someone who has worked and paid tax for five years at a typical wage has earned something too.

For employers

If you sponsor staff earning under £50,271, many of them will now be looking at ten years instead of five. Some will be anxious, and some will start looking elsewhere. A short, accurate note to staff now is better than rumours, and so is a plan for who needs support and when.

Where do you stand?

Should someone on £45,000, working and paying tax, wait twice as long to settle as a colleague on £51,000? I would like to hear from employers, workers and other advisers, especially if you see it differently. Add your view in the form below.

Sources

• A Fairer Pathway to Settlement: Government response to the consultation (CP 1707), GOV.UK, 2 November 2026: dependants aged 18 to 24 and 25 or over; public funds; immigration breaches; Annex A (people affected) and Annex B (fiscal estimates).
• Migration Advisory Committee, Review of salary requirements, January 2026.
• ONS, Employee earnings in the UK: 2026 (ASHE provisional), 22 October 2026, Tables 7.7a and 14.7a.
• Home Office immigration and nationality fees, 8 October 2026 and GOV.UK, Immigration Health Surcharge. Cost figures are illustrative, at today’s fees, for one 5-year Skilled Worker visa plus one extension, excluding employer costs and future fee changes.
• GOV.UK: Skilled Worker visa (no access to most benefits), Student finance: who qualifies, Citizenship if you have indefinite leave to remain.