27 June 2025

In its hotly anticipated report published on 10 June 2025, The Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) has recommended that the minimum income requirement (MIR) for partner applications under the family route should not be further increased from its current level of £29,000.

It also made a number of criticisms of the current financial requirements and offered positive recommendations aimed at simplifying the route, making it fairer and reducing the significant negative impacts that the MIR can have on the family life of British citizens/settled residents.

Background

Following a MAC report published in 2011, the MIR to sponsor a partner was set at £18,600 from July 2012 and remained at this level until April 2024 when the Conservative Government increased it to its current level of £29,000. It had initially planned to increase the MIR to £38,700 immediately, however following significant opposition to the decision, opted instead for a phased approach, raising the MIR to £29,000 with plans to raise it to £34,500 and subsequently £38,700 in early 2025.

However, following the change in government, the planned increases above £29,000 were never implemented. Instead, in September 2024, the Home Secretary froze the threshold and commissioned the MAC to produce a report reviewing the MIR, the previous government’s proposed increases and any other related considerations considered relevant. The commissioning letter stressed the government’s commitment to reducing net immigration and highlighted that the financial requirements including the MIR are intended to maintain the economic wellbeing of the UK whilst respecting family life.

Review of the current MIR

As well as recommending against a further increase of the current MIR, the MAC strongly implied that the MIR could even be reduced from its current level. However, it refrained from recommending a specific income figure as it considers this to be a ‘political and ethical’ decision for the government to make which is dependent on a number of trade-offs and where exactly it considers the balance between the economic wellbeing of the UK and the importance it attaches to family life should lie.

Instead, it presented a number of different potential MIR income figure options for the government’s consideration using different measures to calculate the figures. For example, measures including those based on living standards which aim for the couple to have sufficient income to maintain a given standard of living and a benefits threshold measure, a level of income which makes them ineligible for income-related benefits.

The MAC suggested that if the government wishes to consider a MIR that puts more weight on family life, a MIR of £21,200 shall be appropriate whereas if it wants to use a living standards approach that ‘puts more emphasis on economic wellbeing and less on family life, indicators in the £24,000 to £28,000 range can also be justified’.

The MAC also compared the UK’s MIR with that of other high income countries and found that all but one of those countries either had no minimum income requirement, or had one set at a level “substantially lower” than the UK’s, thereby putting “less emphasis on economic wellbeing and more on family life”.

Previous government’s planned increases

The previous government had planned to increase the MIR to £38,700 in line with the minimum general threshold applicable to the Skilled Worker route. The report strongly advised against this previously planned increase and questioned the rationale behind it since the family route “has a completely different objective and purpose to the [Skilled] work route”. The MAC argued that any increase would most likely conflict with international law, namely the UK’s Article 8 obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights (Right to family and private life). It also understandably made it very clear that it had not been consulted prior to the planned increase being announced.

Current rules’ impact on families

The MAC’s call for evidence for this report received the highest number of responses for a MAC consultation to date. Of those who responded, 43% reported they had been separated from their partner/family while in the process of applying for a Family visa/meeting the financial requirements. It is positive that the experiences of affected families have been shared in a formal setting and that the report draws attention to the “persistent and long lasting” detrimental impact of the current route on the mental health of some applicants and their families.

Further recommended changes

Counting applicant’s income

The UK’s current rules only allow the income of the sponsoring partner to be counted towards to the MIR for applications made from outside the UK even in circumstances where the applicant has a confirmed job offer in the UK. The MAC struggled to understand the rationale behind this rule and recommended that the Government ‘should explore ways to take into account the non-UK applicant’s earnings’ in these circumstances. It highlighted that such a change should ‘help to mitigate some of the specific problems faced by British/settled women who are primary caregivers returning from aboard with non-UK partners who are the main earners in the household’.

It also stressed how sponsor income alone is not an accurate indication of the fiscal impact of the partner on the economic wellbeing of the UK and as the income of the non-citizen partner in most cases is not known at the time of the application, it was extremely difficult to advise on the economic impacts to the UK without this crucial data. It argued that if this income was allowed to be counted it would give more of a clear indication of the family’s financial resources and lower the fiscal risk of their entry.

Regional variation in MIR

The MAC recommended against having different MIR thresholds depending on which region of the UK the sponsoring partner lives. It considered that such a change could create unintended incentives for families to relocate within the UK and highlighted that income differences are often larger within than across regions and could therefore pose operational challenges. To make it fairer to UK residents living outside London, it did however recommend that the Government could consider calculating the threshold by excluding the income data from London.

Separation and delays caused by evidential requirements

The report highlighted how as a result of the strict evidential requirements, many couples experience prolonged periods of separation even in cases where the income being used comfortably meets  the MIR. It gave the example of having to wait until six months payslips have been received before the application can be submitted and recommended this rule is simplified arguing that it is not proportionate to separate families “purely by this administrative requirement.”

Self-employment

The committee considered that there was no “strong rationale for preventing self-employment income from being combined with cash savings” as is currently the case.

The MAC also encouraged the Home Office to review options to simply the current extremely complex rules for evidencing self-employment income. The complexity of the current rules for evidencing self-employment income regularly trips applicants up and result in (arguably) unnecessary refusals despite the MIR threshold being met. We therefore particularly welcome this recommendation.

Future increases to MIR

The report highlighted how the MIR threshold had previously remained at the same level (£18,600) for almost 12 years. It recommends that uprating the threshold on an annual basis is important to ensure both that policy continues to meet its objectives and that the threshold does not decrease in real terms over time and suggested the government should release the uprated level of MIR at least one year in advance to ensure applicants have sufficient time to prepare.

Next steps

The government will now consider the MAC’s recommendations before announcing any changes to the financial requirements under the family route. It appears unlikely that the current MIR threshold will be increased in the near future and given the strength of criticism in the report, certainly not as drastically as planned by the previous government. This should provide some relief to individuals not currently able to apply who have been concerned that they would not be able to qualify under the planned increases.

It is far less clear and appears unlikely however, that the government will be brave enough to reduce the current MIR, given both the political climate and its commitment to reducing net migration.

Whilst there are many recommendations to be positive about, it remains to be seen whether the government will choose to implement them and how. The specific detail of any changes shall ultimately depend on how the government chooses to balance a number of competing interests, including its commitment to reducing net migration, the economic impacts to the UK, creating a fair and coherent family route and respect for family life.

Get in touch
If you have any queries relating to the family route and require assistance, contact your assigned LDI lawyer or our Enquiries team at enquiries@lauradevine.com, and we will be pleased to discuss how we can help. You can also subscribe to our mailing list to receive the latest updates to UK immigration law.