Home Secretary’s statement reveals further details about ‘earned settlement’

The Home Secretary made a statement in the House of Commons on 02.11.2026 regarding the ‘earned settlement’.

The statement is supplemented by a detailed response to the consultation which was published around the same time as the speech, eight months after the consultation ended.

We are expecting a statement of changes to the Immigration Rules in December 2026, with the changes taking effect throughout 2027.

So what do we know now? Here are the highlights.

Standard qualifying periods

As expected, the following groups will have a three-year qualifying period:

• Those who are earning £125,141 a year
• Those who are in ‘high talent’ routes, namely Global Talent, Innovator Founder and Sportsperson

The following groups will have a five-year qualifying period:

• Those who are earning £50,271 a year
• Those working in a qualifying public service job, i.e. education or healthcare
• Those who have a ‘British connection’, such as the partner or parent of a British citizen or those on the UK Ancestry route

Others will have the same qualifying period they have now:

• The Hong Kong BN(O) route
• Afghan Schemes
• Windrush
• HM Armed Forces, including Gurkhas
• Bereaved partners
• Unaccompanied asylum-seeking children
• Children in local authority care
• Children and young people who grew up in the UK
• Victims of domestic abuse

The policy document doesn’t name Adult Dependent Relatives.

The following groups are completely outside of these proposals, including the mandatory minimums:

• EU Settlement Scheme
• Turkish businesspeople and workers 

Everyone else will have a ten-year qualifying period as standard, with some exceptions.

Mandatory minimums

Applicants will also be required to meet the following mandatory minimums:

• ‘Spotless’ criminal record, which means literally no criminal record; even an absolute discharge or a caution will now see you refused settlement, presumably forever
• English language requirement at level B2 (other than refugees on a UK Resettlement Scheme)
• No unpaid government debt, such as NHS and litigation debt

Transitional provisions

They will be split into two groups:

• Group one are carers who meet the settlement sponsorship and salary requirements of the Skilled Worker route, including a salary above £25,000, who will keep their five-year qualifying period.
• Group two are carers who do not meet all of these requirements. This includes, for example, carers earning below the required salary or who are not currently sponsored. They will be able to obtain a further five-year visa extension, which will not be tied to any particular employer, and will be able to settle at the end of that period if they meet the requirements by then.

Carers who joined after will be subject to a standard ten-year route, though in either case they may benefit from this policy:

From 1 February 2027 care workers who have lost their employment due to the sponsor licence being removed will have up to 120 days to get a secure job offer, and a further 60 days to resolve their visa and employment status. If they are not able to secure a job offer within 120 days, or resolve their employment status within 180 days, we will curtail their visa, and the individual will need to leave the UK.

Public service workers who joined the route before May 2025 will also benefit from a five-year route under transitional provisions if they are on a national pay scale and work in healthcare or education below RQF level 6, such as nursing auxiliaries and teaching assistants.

Separately, public service workers employed in an occupation previously identified by the Migration Advisory Committee, including teachers, lecturers, nurses and doctors, will qualify for a permanent five-year qualifying period. 

Refugees

Refugees who enter the UK on one of the ‘safe and legal routes’ soon to be implemented by the government will have a five-year route to settlement.

As previously threatened, anyone arriving by a route other than a safe and legal route will have a 20-year route to settlement. A further ten years will be added to this if the applicant arrived illegally, such as by way of small boat. For anyone not paying attention that means a whopping 30-year qualifying period.

Those in work or study may be able to reduce their qualifying period by ten years, but only by first switching into the new Protection Work and Study route.

Immigration law breaches and benefits

Anyone who has previously breached immigration law, which will be defined as overstaying, breaching a condition of their visa, using deception in an application or frustrating immigration control, will have an automatic 20-year qualifying period which cannot be reduced even in the face of positive factors such as high earnings.

Those applying in the three, five and ten-year qualifying periods will be expected not to have claimed public funds in the previous five years. If the applicant must keep claiming public funds (you know, to be able to feed themselves and their children without ending up on the street), they will be able to settle after 20 years instead.

Ten-year long residence

The ten-year long residence route to indefinite leave to remain will be closed, as expected. You will now be able to count time spent in routes that lead to settlement towards the qualifying period, namely:

• longer-term work, talent and family routes, referred to as core permission
• specified talent and innovation routes, referred to as the high talent group
• Family and Private Life
• Core Protection Work and Study
• Core Protection; and
• Safe and Legal routes

‘Core permission’ includes current five-year partner and parent routes. It excludes ‘Article 8 ECHR cases’.

There is also a list of routes that will not count towards one’s qualifying period:

• Visit
• Student
• Global Business Mobility
• Temporary Worker Routes
• Youth Mobility
• Seasonal Worker
• Overseas Domestic Worker
• Graduate and High Potential Individual
• Ukraine Scheme routes, including the Homes for Ukraine Sponsorship Scheme, the Ukraine Family Scheme, the Ukraine Extension Scheme and the Ukraine Permission Extension Scheme
• Leave Outside the Rules (LOTR)

Not all routes to settlement can be combined, even under this new model:

Under Earned Settlement, time spent on protection or human-rights routes (for example, refugee or Article 8 routes) will not be able to be combined with time spent on work or family routes to meet the qualifying residence period. Where someone moves between these routes, the qualifying period for the new settlement pathway will start when they move onto it.

This prevents people from ‘topping up’ time accrued on one type of route with time on a fundamentally different route in order to reach settlement sooner. For example, someone who comes to the UK on a work visa and later claims asylum will not be able to count their previous work-route residence towards the qualifying period for settlement through the protection system.

The normal pathway to settlement from Core Protection will be 20 years. However, refugees will be able to earn a shorter pathway by moving into sustained work, education or training. Those who do so will be able to move onto Protection Work and Study and may qualify for settlement after 10 years on that route, provided they meet the relevant requirements.

Dependants

Partner dependants will be able to settle at broadly the same time as the main applicant, unless they moved here later, instead of having their own independent qualifying period based on their own contributions.

Children under 18 will be able to settle at the same time as their parents, as now. They won’t have to meet the income, government debt, English language or Life in the UK requirements, though they will remain subject to the suitability requirements.

Children between 18 and 24 will be able to settle at the same time as their parents and will be exempt from the individual income (National Insurance contributions) requirement. However, they will need to meet the other mandatory minimums. Crucially, it appears someone in this position can settle before their parents in certain circumstances, which the following example suggests:

A 22-year-old university graduate remains in the UK with child dependant status. They can settle as a dependant only when both of their parents settle. Alternatively, they may apply for settlement independently if they meet all the mandatory and qualifying requirements of a relevant pathway.

Children 25 or over will be expected to qualify for settlement independently, by meeting all mandatory minimums, or switch into their own immigration route to settlement in their own right. This is worded as:

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. By that stage, the Government considers it reasonable normally to expect an adult to establish an independent basis for settlement, while retaining appropriate safeguards.

How earnings are considered

There are three brackets, in line with the above:

• three years for the highest economic contributors (earning at least £125,141, in line with the additional rate of income tax);
• five years for higher earners (earning at least £50,271, in line with the higher rate of income tax); and
• ten years as the default for those making a sustained contribution of £12,571.

The new rules will take a depressingly-named ‘best years’ approach. For example, where someone is on a five-year route to settlement, the government will look at their strongest three years out of the five when assessing whether the requirements are met. This is designed to mitigate the impact parental leave, caring responsibilities and long-term sickness can have on an applicant’s ability to meet the requirements.

So for a three-year qualifying period, the applicant is expected to make £125,141 per year in three of the last four years. For a five-year qualifying period, it’s £50,271 per year in three of the last five years. For a ten-year qualifying period, it’s £12,571 per year in five of the seven years immediately before settlement. The example given is this:

For example, someone on the standard 10-year pathway earns above £12,571 for three years, then takes two years of maternity leave during which her earnings fall below the threshold. She then returns to work and earns above £12,571 for a further two years. In total, she has met the earnings threshold in five of the seven years immediately before applying for settlement, so she meets the contribution requirement.

There will be unspecified exemptions:

Exemptions will apply where it would be inappropriate to require someone to demonstrate a minimum income requirement of £12,571. This will include children, people aged 65 and over, and those unable to meet the requirement because of a physical or mental condition.

It’s confirmed that the thresholds for the different reductions based on income will move with the corresponding tax brackets when they do. 

Partners will be able to rely on a household income:

Having considered the consultation responses, under Earned Settlement eligible couples will be able to combine their earnings to meet the minimum economic contribution requirement. The household income threshold will be £25,142, twice the individual minimum income requirement. It will remain set at twice the individual rate and will therefore change in line with any future changes to the National Insurance threshold.

For example, one partner could meet the household income threshold through their earnings alone, or both partners could combine their earnings to reach it. A partner who works fewer hours, for example because they are caring for children or other family members, will not necessarily need to meet the individual £12,571 threshold themselves, provided the couple meets the combined partner threshold together.