Home Office accused of basing foreign student policy on 'fantasy'

The Government has been accused of basing its policies towards overseas students on “fantasy” after official reports laid waste to claims that foreigners exploit education as an excuse to come and stay in the UK.

Under previous data used to form policy it has been suggested that up to 100,000 more students were staying compared to those leaving each year, but new data collected looks at figures differently to suggest only 4,600 might have overstayed on their visas.

The latest Home Office paper looking at new “exit check” data showed almost all foreign students whose visa expired during 2016-17 left the country on time.

Further analysis of exit checks by the Office for National Statistics also found the vast majority of students in 2015 and 2016 either left when their visa expired or were granted permission to stay.

It comes the day after the Government launched a commission to explore the benefits of overseas students, with Theresa May having long blocked any bid to remove their numbers from data on net migration, which she has vowed to drive down.

For years the Government relied on the International Passenger Survey to record students numbers, which compares immigrants arriving to study against those leaving who say they had previously immigrated to study.

Concerns had been raised about the “gap” between the two figures which averaged around 100,000 per year since 2012 and was 73,000 in provisional estimates for the year ending December 2016.

But since last year the ONS has been exploring new ways to assess what students do, including looking at exit check data – which now suggests those who failed to leave within the legitimate time frame allowed by their visa was around 4,600 in 2016-17.

Meanwhile the Home Office report published on Thursday showed 97 per cent of overseas students left before their visa expired in 2016-17.

An article from the ONS on international students said that before exit checks were undertaken, the method for ascertaining student departures had flaws and was “not a robust statistic”.

The paper written by Iain Bell, deputy national statistician for the ONS, concluded: “There is no evidence of a major issue of non-EU students overstaying their entitlement to stay.”

At Conservative conference last year Home Secretary Amber Rudd launched a new immigration crackdown with a particular focus on students.

But Shadow Foreign Secretary Diane Abbott said today: “It seems that [Theresa May’s] long-running campaign to malign international students is based on fantasy, with no evidence of a major issue with students overstaying.

“Some in government appear to be waking up to the idea that overseas students make a valuable contribution to our country and have belatedly asked the Migration Advisory Committee to gather evidence.”

Ms Rudd announced today that she would ask her independent advisers on immigration to review the costs and benefits of overseas students.

She said: “There is no limit to the number of genuine international students who can come to the UK to study and the fact that we remain the second most popular global destination for those seeking higher education is something to be proud of.

“We understand how important students from around the world are to our higher education sector, which is a key export for our country, and that’s why we want to have a robust and independent evidence base of their value and the impact they have.”

The move follows warnings by universities that classing the students as long-term migrants is deterring young people from coming to Britain to study and damaging its successful higher education sector.

Other cabinet ministers including Philip Hammond and Boris Johnson have indicated a willingness to take students out of net migration data, but until now Ms May has refused.