The Home Office just cut care workers settlement wait and will not say the cost

Shabana Mahmood just dropped a plan that would have made migrant care workers wait 15 years for settlement in Britain.

She has cut that wait to five years instead.

She announced it to the House of Commons two days ago. She had met union leaders that same morning.

So who does this actually cover?

Care workers already in the UK who arrived before May 2025. They need to earn at least £25,000 a year. And they need to have kept to their visa conditions.

So why the change?

More than 100 Labour backbench MPs signed a letter against the 15-year wait.

Angela Rayner, the Housing Secretary, called it "un-British".

Diane Abbott, a Labour MP, warned it risked another Windrush-style scandal.

That's a Cabinet minister and a backbencher both warning the party about its own policy.

Here's where the 15-year figure came from. The Home Office ran a consultation for three months. It closed nine months ago. More than 200,000 people replied.

The plan it produced set a 10-year wait for most economic migrants. Lower-paid workers, including care workers, would wait 15.

Now look at the policy as it stands today.

Most economic migrants face a 10-year wait. That's double the current five years.

Workers earning more than £50,000 a year can settle after five years. So can public service workers — doctors, nurses, teachers.

Workers earning more than £125,000 a year can settle after three.

And refugees who arrive by small boat? Twenty years if they work or study. Thirty years if they don't.

Mahmood says this is not a U-turn. She rejects that word outright.

She says settlement has to be earned, not automatic. That is the line she has given Parliament and the broadcasters alike.