Two days ago, the Home Office sent an email to international students warning them of their recent move to reassess and potentially revoke asylum status for thousands, on the basis that they first arrived through student status. This action is a dangerous escalation of a policy agenda steeped in xenophobia, political opportunism, and a fundamental failure to understand and empathise with those seeking safety.
Let’s be clear: asylum is not a favour. It is a legal and moral obligation rooted in the recognition that people’s relationships with their home countries can and do change. Political contexts shift. Regimes become more violent. Laws become more repressive. Communities are torn apart by war. Climate catastrophe destroys homes. And for many, returning home is not just unsafe, it is unthinkable.
In the governments’ haste to reduce net migration figures, they opt to continue the tirade of policies inherited by the previous government designed to vilify and scapegoat some of our most vulnerable colleagues.
Whether it was requiring international students to be isolated and leave behind their families through the dependants’ policy. Whether it is the recent threats against the graduate route visa preventing those we upskill from supporting our industries here in the UK. Whether it is the proposed international student levy that will impact international student recruiting and potentially expedite the collapse of the Higher Education sector in the UK as well as price out many talented students from across the world, or this policy. One that will see students who cannot stop watching, with fear and concern, as the situation in their home countries shift, who know that no matter what they must return, and that they are not safe.
The message being sent is chilling: you are never truly welcome. For migrants of all backgrounds, even if you survive the journey, even if you integrate, even if you contribute mass amounts every year—your right to stay is conditional, precarious, and subject to political mood swings.
We at NUS UK stand firmly against this policy. As we continue the fight to see international students’ rights improved we will continue to need every one of you.
