Student visas ‘increasingly used as back door’ to work in UK
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/01/23/student-visas-increasingly-used-as-backdoor-to-work-in-uk/
Posted by JayR_97
Student visas ‘increasingly used as back door’ to work in UK
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/01/23/student-visas-increasingly-used-as-backdoor-to-work-in-uk/
Posted by JayR_97
49 Comments
Yeah, and bears typically shit in the woods, any new information here?
‘Back door’ implies this is clandestine.
The title should be ‘student visas increasingly used as massive open front door to work in uk’
This has been a well known phenomenon for well over a decade, why is the telegraph choosing now to flag this?
Back door implies something illegal or underhand, when in reality, as the article confirms:
>Half of non-EU students and their dependants **switched to work or other visas in 2024**
But I was assured that our uni system is the envy of the world and definitely wasnt being abused for visas
oh no educated young professionals keep coming hear spending large sums of money then getting jobs
“Half of non-EU students and their dependants switched to work or other visas in 2024 after three years in the UK compared with just 10 per cent less than three years previously, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).”
So the story here is that people finish their course and then apply for a work visa to work once they’ve finished studying? Not exactly the same as what the headline implies (which is all most people will read) that people are coming to (pretend to) study and then are working instead.
If someone applies for a different type of visa and you grant that different type of visa to them, it’s not really a backdoor is it? Perhaps if you don’t like people having a work visa, then maybe don’t grant them a work visa. No need for the continued university bashing.
“Telegraph increasingly used to rile people up and give them an excuse to kick someone worse off then them!”
Shitrag for dummies.
There was a time when “people pay us a ton of money, then perform highly skilled work for us” was considered a good thing
“Young University educated people choosing to stay in UK rather than returning abroad”
‘Increasingly’ probably doing a lot of work there. Typical Telegraph propaganda.
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It’s almost as if people from other countries want to live in the UK? That’s crazy.
Breaking. “Australia to deport thousands of Brits on working visas coz they can”.
Yes we know. We also know it’s used as a backdoor to bring dependents
Yea mate no shit. Half my mates in Birmingham have done this
The heading is so misleading. Rishi Sunak’s government put end to students who are in student visa to change to skilled worker visa until they finish their degree. So, if you spend tens of thousand in uni fee and graduate, ofcourse they will apply for work visa. It is not back door or illegal because last government banned hoping of visas but this was implemented only last year.
It’s good if it is, but I think many struggle to find companies willing to sponsor them for a graduate visa as well. The paperwork is still a headache.
>As many as half of those opting for work take jobs in social care, where there are an estimated 150,000 vacancies
People coming over here, finishing their degrees in 3 years, then working in social care… makes me sick! /s
Quelle surprise!!
Don’t worry though. Rach from complaints is busy wrecking the jobs market and businesses.
Can’t wait till around May/June when the damage REALLY hits.
This isn’t a new thing, when I was working at a McDonald’s over 20 years ago the entire kitchen staff was comprised of people working full time while on a student visa.
Scrap the post study work visa and see how many people still come to do university courses, that’s the real test to see if the university is the draw.
Except not.
A student visa legally entitles you to work a maximum of 20 hours a week due to the purpose of your stay in the UK being studying.
If certain nationalities are abusing the visa system to work more hours because they cannot afford to be in the UK (which, curiously enough is a requirement to be able to be granted a visa by the Home Office) or (il)legally switching visas once in the UK (like that South Asian girl who illegally swapped to a skilled home care visa while on her student visa), or using student visas to bring in dependents to the UK, student visas are not to blame.
Before July 2023, students could transfer to a skilled worker visa without completing the course
The misinformation surrounding this is insane. I really do t get why international students keep being targeted. My job is to issue the document they need to apply for their student visas. I have done this for several large London based universities. This entire regime is so strictly controlled and monitored that it is actually really difficult to abuse the system.
Getting a student visa and then switching to a work visa is not an abuse of the system necessarily. The fact is that it is extremely difficult to get a work visa from outside the U.K., But once you’re here (eg as a student) then it’s easier to attend interviews and do the leg work to find a job that will sponsor you. But even that is difficult because sponsors have to *justify* why they are hiring a foreign worker over a British national. They can’t just pluck students off the street and throw jobs at them – it just doesn’t work that way.
Universities are also punished for students that don’t complete their course. Universities have to maintain at least an 80% completion rate for their courses and if they don’t, they risk fines and losing their license to sponsor students at all. It is not in the university’s interests to bring students here if they don’t intend to complete their programme.
As with ALL systems that have ever existed there will always be a select few who bend, break or circumvent the rules. I know a lot about this subject so will happily answer any questions better than this shitty article has done.
PMSL 🤣 I’ve been saying for years this is the most abused system ever.
Mr potato head, Mr potato head! Back doors are not secrets.
When I bought a house the first thing I did was brick up the back door.
Are they paying tax ?
If so, I don’t care, the telegraph is a piss poor culture war rag.
Hasn’t this been the case for decades? I remember that old border force programme Bill Nighy narrated dealing with this issue.
I’m genuinely confused by this article. 3 years is 1 year master’s + 2 year graduate working visa. Of course then someone who wants to stay here will switch to another sort of visa??
Not really “back door” if they’re using a route the UK immigration service offers 😂
More like a “side door” to working in the UK
Bwahaha, as if we all didn’t already know this.
Student visas should:
– Only apply to foreigners under the age of 26.
– barred from bringing any family members or dependants.
– immediate deportation if you have not finished your course / stopped attending university.
– barred from any work
– deported if found to be working illegally.
You’re here to learn, not work / take jobs from local teens / graduates.
Yep, and is done so by many brits in many countries – The amount of ‘muay thai visas’…
So we don’t want educated people working here then?
This is *such* a deeply misleading headline honestly.
If you want a deeper dive into what’s going on with UK foreign students look no further than here – [https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/student-migration-to-the-uk/](https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/student-migration-to-the-uk/)
The biggest changes since 2019, that the way the Telegraph chooses to present here leads to some confusion, is that we have lost over 50% of our EU students and seen students from India, Nigeria, and Pakistan grow by over 50%.
What we’ve seen is that we have replaced young 18-21 year old undergraduates with people who are coming here to do postgraduate studies, often much older, often already into a professional career.
I say The Telegraph is misleading here because *obviously* these people are older, its a much more significant move than the old jaunt from Europe used to be, so *of course* they are typically looking to bring a family with them and ideally looking to find work here with their new qualifications.
I find it frustrating because this is *exactly* what outlets like The Telegraph have been advocating for for the last decade. And now its happened all they’re doing is complaining and pointing fingers like this was all a big surprise or unexpected.
How is it possible? The uni fee costs more than the money they can earn.
considering the state of the wages and job market it’s impressive they even bother
Well the government does provide a two year post study work visa!
I question the term increasingly. In terms of a number probably most immigration is “increased”. As an obvious route hardly. In the 90’s half of the pokey offices above shops in central London were either dodgy “Language Schools” or Brothels either way work permits were not required.
Good. We meed workers! Now lets see if some of those useless locally bred benefit abusing locals find the back door and emigrate
Ah yes that immigrant we’re supposed to be mad at for working and not working?
The Torygraph targeting immigrants again, what a surprise.
Yeah, no shit? That’s the fucking point, right? You **want** people that study in your country to stay and contribute to your economy through paying taxes.
Same thing is happening in Canada and Australia – large numbers of low skilled migrants doing low quality degrees simply as a means to enter the country legally to then file a fake asylum claim or simply overstay the visa and disappear into the system
It’s hardly a back door, they come here on a student visa (paying an absolute crapload in fees), then if they do well in their degrees the best of them persuade U.K. companies to hire them (no small feat considering the extra fees and current ultra-competitive job market). Then once they get a job and have a sponsor for their skilled worker visa, they must pay many, many thousands of pounds more into the NHS as part of the arrangement.
It seems like a win-win from my perspective, we get successful, talented people who contribute far above standard tax norms until they get indefinite leave to remain/citizenship (minimum of 5 years).
Unless I’m missing something? Can anyone comment and explain? Is it even possible for low skilled, non-contributing immigrants to abuse this system?
“Don’t look at the rich getting richer while the poor get poorer. Look at the immigrants!”
The majority of uk subs are now just rage bait articles from shit like the Telegraph and Daily Mail.
No surprise we all realised it.
Some universities have 50% overseas students. Needs to stop
I work as an international student advisor at a university – if anyone want’s to ask anything about it feel free!