‘No evidence of widespread abuse’: UK panel recommends retaining graduate route visa

NEW DELHI: The United Kingdom’s Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) has recommended retaining the “graduate route” visa policy, finding no evidence of “abuse” of the policy. The graduate route, which allows international students to stay and work in the UK after completing their studies, had given over 50,000 Indians post-study work option in 2023, 44% of all granted extensions on UK student visas and the most of all nationalities.

In March, the home secretary, James Cleverly, had sought a rapid review of the graduate route visa policy. The MAC submitted its report on May 14.

“We have not found evidence of widespread abuse on the Graduate route, where we define abuse as deliberate non-compliance with immigration rules, and we conclude that the route is not undermining the integrity and quality of the UK higher education system,” wrote Brian Bell, chair, MAC. “We expect the impact on public finances of Graduate visa holders on the route to be small but positive, as most appear to work, are young, and have no recourse to public funds.”

Bell added that the review also found that some agents may be “mis-selling UK higher education and exploiting students in the process”.

UK Student Visa: Retain graduate route

The MAC has recommended "retaining the graduate route in its current form". The letter to Cleverly and the report have noted that the changes in visa regulations which have barred entry of dependents of international students "are already substantially reducing international student numbers" and that this change "will likely have a significant effect on graduate route usage going forward". The MAC has recommended waiting to assess their full impact before making more changes.

"Implementing additional restrictions or closing the route now could risk overcorrection," wrote Bell. Indians were the main beneficiaries of the dependent visa regulations as well.

He also reminded the home secretary of the heavy dependence of UK universities on revenues generated from international students.

"Given international student fees help make up the financial deficit that universities have from teaching domestic students and research, any significant, any significant restrictions to the route should only be considered once the structural funding issues in the higher education sector have been addressed," he wrote.

Registration of study abroad consultants

The MAC has also recommended a "mandatory registration system" for international recruitment agents and subagents, better known as overseas education consultants in India.

"We recommend that universities should be required to publish data on their spend on recruitment agents and the number of international students recruited through such means annually as a starting point to improving disclosure," says the letter. "Whilst most agents play an important role in promoting the UK and in supporting international students, we found some examples of bad practice from certain agents."

This, the MAC chair's letter says, will ensure the standards of UK's higher education are maintained.

UK Universities: Monitoring and data

The MAC has recommended that the UK government make it mandatory for universities to "provide confirmation of the course outcome" -- for example, what class of degree a student has earned -- along with the confirmation that the student has completed the course which the government already requires.

The letter also points out that some of the figures Cleverly used in his letter commissioning the rapid review had used wrong data. "We note that some of the data you referred to in your commissioning letter was incorrect," says Bell's letter. "This data was not referring to those that had switched from the Graduate route to the Skilled Worker route, rather it covered those that had switched from the Student route to the Skilled Worker route."

The MAC has now recommended that the home office "undertake a review of the data variables used for analytical purposes across the largest visa routes".