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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Nobody who regularly goes to football matches wants this changed I don't want to be covered in beer every time we score because people are performatively doing "limbs"

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

@mark-heath.bsky.social Looks like you'd better start writing a CV. You're gonna need it when Chat KOA takes over next season

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

How much do migrants receive in Universal Credit payments? In the year ending March 2026, the DWP made £80 billion in UC payments – 8.3% (or £6.7bn) was paid to households with at least one EEA-national claimant and 7.7% (or £6.2bn) to households with at least one non-EEA-national claimant.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

Which sports use International Sportsperson visas? Cricket clubs, by quite some distance. They made up 57% of sponsors in the year ending June 2025. Note that this is the number of organisations sponsoring, not the number of IS visas granted. The Home Office wouldn't give me that info.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

Between Jan 2021 and March 2026, 52k international students switched into the care sector (44% of people who switched from study to work visas). Will these study-to-care switchers stay in the sector? That will depend on whether the qualifying period for ILR is increased from 5 to 15 years... (1/2)

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Since 2021, 160,000 Hong Kongers have migrated to the UK via the humanitarian BNO visa route. Our new briefing looks at BNOs’ characteristics, their economic outcomes, and how many expect to stay in the UK long term. migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/br...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

Really interesting piece by Martin Samuel in The Times related to the fact that almost a quarter of players at this World Cup are foreign-born. He says it's evidence that the international game now behaves much more like the club game. www.thetimes.com/article/b0d2...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

In 2021, foreign nationals were slightly less likely to live in social housing than British citizens. However, the share of new social housing lettings in England to non-UK nationals has increased in recent years, likely due to their rising share in the population.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 05/06/2026

Foreign-born players make up the majority of footballers in eight of the World Cup's 48 squads. At the top of that list is Curaçao, where almost all of the squad were born in the Netherlands (96%). theconversation.com/how-migratio...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Nearly a quarter of players at this year's World Cup were born in a different country from the one they're representing. But do teams with more migrant players perform better on the pitch? @adamjst.bsky.social and I looked at the evidence. www.compas.ox.ac.uk/article/has-...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

The smaller number of work migrants meant that lower-earning groups (e.g., refugees, family of Brits, and health & care dependants) made up a higher share of the total inflow. Those workers affected were predominantly in the middle/upper-middle of the earnings distribution.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

Since 2024, the earnings of new non-EU employees (relative to the median) have fallen back significantly, despite the fact that restrictions introduced in 2024/2025 made the work visa system more selective. Why?

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

Today's net migration statistics show that 171,000 more people arrived in the UK than left in 2025. That's down 82% compared to the historical high seen in early 2023 (944,000).

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

Are migrants more likely to claim benefits than UK nationals? In March 2025, 15% of individuals in receipt of a Universal Credit payment were non-UK (and non-Irish) nationals aged 16 or over. This compares to just over 13% of non-UK or Irish nationals in the wider population.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 04/05/2026

Maybe the time for this has passed, but I love the slightly different "OOOHHHH"s after these three chances

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

The UK's immigration system is pretty expensive, especially if migrants come with their partners or children.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

How much do migrants on Skilled Worker visas get paid? New FOI data show big differences by skill level and whether the job was in healthcare or other industries. For context, median earnings for full-time employees were £39,000 over the same period.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

Indian nationals continue to hold the largest number of employments, while the number of jobs held by Nigerians has surpassed the number held by Poles. You can find the full release from HMRC here: www.gov.uk/government/s...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 15/04/2026

New HMRC data show that the number of employee jobs held by non-EU nationals rose by 6% over 2025, while EU jobs fell by 3%. This will be driven primarily by net migration, but it could also reflect improved employment rates for earlier non-EU arrivals, such as Ukrainians.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 29/03/2026

From a net migration perspective, the length of the scheme is almost as important as any cap or 'emergency brake'. A shorter duration reduces the ability for EU citizens to switch onto other visas, rather than emigrating when the YM visa expires

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

The language threshold for settlement is set to rise from lower-intermediate (B1) to upper-intermediate (B2) in March 2027. So far, the increase has been confirmed for these routes...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

On Monday, the government said it hadn't decided whether to apply the minimum English language requirement to acquire settlement to Hong Kong BNOs (and some other groups).

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

I mean, that's just not a penalty, is it? We're barely touching him

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

Skills gaps are only one reason why employers hire migrant workers. In fact, many report hiring migrants through traditional recruitment processes. This may be one reason why the Migration Advisory Committee found no link between skill shortages and work visa grants.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

Policy debates often focus on who is eligible for work visas, but main applicants on work visas make up only a small share of overall migration. You can see what that means in this chart, which compares Skilled Worker visa grants with changes in the size of the migrant workforce.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

The government has tightened work visa rules for middle-skill jobs. Now, middle-skill jobs are eligible for work visas only if they are crucial to the industrial strategy, and employers in those sectors will need to create workforce plans to develop domestic skills.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

Can the government boost domestic training by restricting migration? In a new briefing, @msumption.bsky.social and I find that migrants on work visas are a small part of a much wider picture. Here's what you need to know, in three posts. migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/co...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 17/02/2026

Completely agree with this on some of vitriol being sent to the Ipswich players from their own 'fans' A few seem to have forgotten how bad things were for #itfc as recently as 2021. The club is in a much better place now, even if George Hirst misses a few sitters

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

65% of the increase in the UK’s population between 2004 and 2023 was due to international migration. Births—another driver of population growth—have declined over the same period.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

It also prioritises Skilled Workers who earn less, and so make a smaller contribution to the public finances. For example, a librarian earning £41,700 would be prioritised over an IT director earning £85,000.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

Employers in areas with lower salaries are less likely to be able to afford the median. Grads/young migrants at the start of their careers also find it difficult to be hired at median earnings. The UK has a 'new entrant discount' (currently 4 years), but it takes them longer to earn the median.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 22/12/2025

The Migration Advisory Committee has recommended that the government reduce occupation-specific thresholds for Skilled Workers. Here's why, in 3 posts...

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 20/11/2025

The qualifying period to settlement will be increased to a baseline of 10 years. These criteria will increase or reduce that time, for those who qualify. Only one criterion from each table can be applied

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 28/10/2025

The partners of Skilled Workers had higher median earnings, at £30,200, in the year ending March 2024. That's around median earnings for all employees.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 28/10/2025

Many partners of health and care workers were also working in the sector. Overall, their median earnings were £22,100 in the year ending March 2024.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Conviction and imprisonment rates vary widely by nationality. We can be confident that some smaller nationalities (e.g. Albanians) are overrepresented, but we can't say how much, because the UK's population stats are highly uncertain. However, we can estimate this for larger non-citizen groups.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Foreign nationals are overrepresented among drug and fraud offenders, while underrepresented for violent offences & robbery. For sexual offences, it's more complicated. Non-citizens are overrepresented for cautions/convictions but underrepresented in the prison population.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

Overall, incarceration and conviction rates are broadly similar for foreign and British nationals. When controlling for age and sex, non-citizens are less likely to be incarcerated than Brits. A big caveat, though: current population statistics aren't very reliable.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 05/09/2025

I'm biased, but our new Q&A on housing for asylum seekers and refugees is an incredibly interesting read. In the Q&A, we cover the following:

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 12/08/2025

What I found most interesting when writing this update was the increased number of students moving to graduate visas, likely a result of more restrictive Skilled Worker criteria. Another 75,000 Graduate visas were granted in the first three months of 2025 alone.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

At the end of June, foreign nationals made up 10% of the sentenced prison population in England and Wales, a little less than their share of the adult population (12%). New MoJ data shows how that differs by offence type.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

Non-EU employees newly entering the workforce under the post-Brexit immigration system appear to have broadly similar earnings compared to those entering before Brexit. Why? Three potential reasons:

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 12/07/2025

I spoke to Full Fact about whether different nationalities are more likely to be in prison. Some probably are, but we don't have the data we need to calculate it. Plus any differences we do see will also reflect differences in other characteristics, such as age and income.

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 10/07/2025

Netherlands would be cool (Cruyff Arena would be awesome!). But after looking at the Maldives, I hope we get a game against second division side Mahibadhoo FC ✅ Next to the beach ✅ Hidden among the houses like Loftus Road or Fratton Park

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Ben Brindle @benbrindle.bsky.social · 08/07/2025

From 22 July, 111 jobs will no longer qualify for Skilled Worker visas, but a sizable number will still be able to recruit migrants. In fact, of the 26,900 people who got a Skilled Worker visa between October and March, 76% were for jobs that will remain eligible.

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