Earned settlement government consultation – take action

In November last year, the Government published a statement announcing their planned changes to settlement (otherwise known as indefinite leave to remain, or ILR). Our colleagues at GMIAU and Praxis produced this helpful explainer, summarising what the proposed changes are and how they would likely impact individuals our sector supports. 

In essence, the Government plans to make it significantly harder for many people to be granted indefinite leave to remain – or settlement. The Government plans to extend the standard route to settlement from 5 to 10 years and for some groups of people their proposed routes to settlement could increase to 15, 20 or 30 years.  

Due to the nature of some of the proposals (e.g. if an individual has accessed public funds – such as Universal Credit – for more than one year, 10 years will be added to their qualifying period for settlement. Likewise, for an individual applying for settlement they will be required to have an earned income above £12,570 for 3-5 years prior to applying for settlement), we anticipate that a significant number of people who we have supported in recent years to be affected by these planned changes.

The Government’s announcement has already caused significant distress to individuals we work with, many of whom have spent long periods of time in the asylum system and, having finally been granted refugee status, were working towards indefinite leave to remain.  To hear that they may now face significant barriers to settlement is devastating.

What can be done?

The Government has launched a consultation on their proposals, which gives individuals and organisations the opportunity to share what they think about what is being proposed. Anybody is welcome to submit a response online and the deadline for doing so is 12th February 2026. At Boaz we will be submitting an organisational response, opposing the proposals, and we would like to encourage you – as a supporter – to also tell the Government what you think about their plans.

You can submit a response here. It should take no longer than 30 minutes and you will only be allowed to submit one response. Don’t worry if you can’t answer every detail in question. What’s most important is that you share why you think these proposals are unfair.

Our colleagues at GMIAU have produced this very helpful guide to the earned settlement consultation, which you can use to help you when making a submission.

If you do make a submission, please email us at [email protected] to tell us. It’s really helpful for us to know when our supporters take a campaign action. Thank you.