July 2026 - Status Now 4 All

7 July 2026: From our signatory organisation – Migrant Voice: Changes to the immigration and asylum systems risk increasing harm

Proposed changes to the immigration and asylum systems pose significant risk to individuals in them, and the country as a whole. These hostile policies create a system where all migrants face increased discrimination, division and hate. Labour must take the opportunity of a change in leadership to rethink this course of action.

Increasing lengths of some visa routes from five years to ten, at least, and then applying it retroactively for those already in the system is a cruel and inhumane proposal which leaves many migrants in fear for our futures. Unable to build lives, or have stability, these proposals undermine our health and our families.

2 July 2026: Freemovement: What’s in the Immigration and Asylum Bill 2026?

The Bill announced in the King’s Speech on 13 May 2026 has now been published and is beginning its slow passage through Parliament. It is the fifth immigration-related Act across five sessions of Parliament, no less. It seeks to fulfil the commitments made in the White Paper a year prior, including draconian new measures to penalise refugees and asylum seekers.

To try and help make sense of it, Free Movement have created an online Bill Tracker app that shows tracked changes on amended versions of other laws that will be affected by the new Bill. The official explanatory notes (the government’s own version of what the clauses of the Bill are supposed to accomplish) are woven through it and it will be kept up to date with amendments and new versions.

So what does it entail? Here are some non-exhaustive highlights: https://freemovement.org.uk/whats-in-the-immigration-and-asylum-bill-2026