Cut student visas to reduce immigration, Home Secretary Suella Braverman says at Tory conference

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  1. Ad free version:

    The number of foreign students coming to the UK should be cut in a bid to reduce immigration, Home Secretary Suella Braverman has said.

    On the fringes of the Conservative Party conference, Ms Braverman suggested she would be looking to introduce more “balance” into the immigration system.

    She claimed the UK has “very, very high numbers” of low-skilled migrants, despite the Government’s points-based immigration system that is supposed to be tailored to the country’s economic needs.

    Ms Braverman suggested she could seek to reduce immigration by cutting the number of student visas.

    Her conference comments follows a report last week that she was leading Cabinet calls for overall immigration to be reduced, despite Liz Truss’s proposal to make it easier for some foreign workers to come to the UK to tackle labour shortages and boost growth.

    The Telegraph had reported that Ms Braverman was among Brexiteer Cabinet ministers, including Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch and Business Secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg, who were insisting Ms Truss’s plans should not lead to an overall rise in immigration.

    This week, at the Young Conservatives fringe event on Monday, she said: “We should be looking more at students.

    “We’ve had a massive increase in the number of students coming into this country.

    Students are a great thing because they are coming here to study and get skills… I do think we do get to a point where we have to look at some of the courses that people are doing in this country, some of the institutions, they are not always very good quality.

    “I think it’s legitimate to question whether that is going to serve our economic objectives, and taking a more discerning, smart approach to the number of student visas I think is highly consistent with our agenda for growth.”

    She added: “I’m also interested in looking at how we look at some of the other visa routes – I think we should inject some balance because there are many benefits to migration… we’ve also got to be honest that many, many, many more people coming here – net migration is very high and it’s increased as well – puts pressure on our services, on our housing and on our community relationships.”

  2. I don’t actually believe they’ll do this, at least not in reality.

    Why? Universities charge the most for international students. Rich students bring in a lot of money for landlords, many of whom are tories, also.

  3. Warped ideology over benefits. International students add more to the economy from tuition fees to living costs to entertainment than they take out. If we are just making our universities (world leading) second rate so they go elsewhere, then I don’t see what benefit the rest of us have

  4. Warped ideology over benefits. International students add more to the economy from tuition fees to living costs to entertainment than they take out. If we are just making our universities (world leading) second rate so they go elsewhere, then I don’t see what benefit the rest of us have

  5. Warped ideology over benefits. International students add more to the economy from tuition fees to living costs to entertainment than they take out. If we are just making our universities (world leading) second rate so they go elsewhere, then I don’t see what benefit the rest of us have

  6. I work in a residential building, one of the tenants is a student from overseas…. They pay…. £45,000 a year in tuition fees alone 🤯 universities are making an absolute killing

  7. Lol international students bring in a lot of money to Unis, this is never going to happen and if it does then the Tories will have cratered education for generations.

  8. Might he considerably better if they simply outlawed all “universities” that aren’t in the top 130 listed in university guides.

    All the rest are either pointless or an immigration scam.

    Though the day the Conservatives meaningfully reduce immigration is the day pigs fly.

  9. Just when I thought she couldn’t say anything more stupid. Probably the worst AG in living memory, she’s now going for the double as worst Home Secretary in living memory (and she has Priti and Theresa for competition there, so not an easy field to excel in).

  10. This won’t happen. Universities attract a lot of post graduate international students, and they’re appealing because they pay ALOT. even though they can’t meet the demands in a lot of cases, they’re appealing to universities. So much so that Russell group universities are making the courses slightly easier.

    Having been in these conversations I can’t prove what I’m saying. But also I have no reason to lie.

  11. When I briefly lectured it became apparent that more money came from wealthy internationals than from UK students. Even had a few students who I swear must have cheated on their online English test as they could barely understand what I said and taught, however the course cost them about 3 times as much as the UK ones…

  12. Reduce the number of people who come here throw money into the economy and then leave. That’s the plan of the party of fiscal responsibility?

    My 5 year old nephew with £10 in a sweet shop has more financial sense than the lot of them.

  13. the slippery anti immigration slope slips again.

    first it’s “we dont have a problem with legal immigration just illegal immigration”,

    then it becomes “we have too many unskilled immgrants”,

    then it becomes ” we have too many skilled immigrants”

    each step is a fake moderate compromise to shift the overton window until they can just openly say they hate immgrants fullstop.

    the next step is usually deport the one’s already here.

  14. One more unusual policy statement from a soon to be sacked minister. It just can’t go on. Why don’t people get out there and make themselves heard? All these poor universities that will just have to make up their losses by raising charges for our childrens’ education? I truly feel for these poor university businesses.

  15. lol. This is what obsession with the numbers get you.

    Educating foreign students is one of our strongest exports. Our domestic further education systems are totally unworkable with it.

  16. Why the fuck *wouldn’t* we want some of the smartest and most motivated young people in the world to come to the UK?

    So many of the best people I know moved to this country as students. They’ve contributed an absolutely enormous amount and made this country better. Blocking people like them from moving here makes us all worse off, financially and in every other sense of the word.

  17. Paying students aren’t the immigration we want to reduce

    Its the Albanian gangsters, Ethiopian gangsters, all the gangsters that travel over on a boat being watched by the coast guard so they don’t drown…

    Let them all fucking drown in my opinion they add no value to our country

  18. THEY HAVE DONE IT ONCE ALREADY.
    Get the students to invest in the name of education, then cut the PSW Visa and kick them out. Repeat tory 2012. War criminals are better than this.

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