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By Emmanuel Adeleke
A member of the United Kingdom Parliament, Carol Monaghan, has kicked against the country’s new visa policy resisting international students from bringing family as dependants except under specific circumstances.
Speaking at parliament on Wednesday, Monaghan stated that foreign students make invaluable contributions to UK’s economy.
The lawmaker, in a video that went viral on Thursday, said international students enriched UK’s society in all sectors, including healthcare, information technology among others.
“International students make an invaluable contributions to the economy.
“The reality is that many students who come into the UK look beyond their studies and want their families to be part of their experience.
“Withholding overseas students from bringing their families, many will opt to go elsewhere and any drop in international students numbers will cause further harm to universities that are already facing financial difficulties.
“The (UK) government’s new policy on international students visas is misjudged,” she said.
Monaghan, who is from Glasgow North West, added that Scotland would have to suffer the consequences of the ‘misjudged’ policy of the government.
On Tuesday, the UK government slammed a restriction on student visa routes in a bid to cut net migration.
The latest policy restricts international students, including those from Nigeria, from bringing family members on all but postgraduate research routes.
Specifically, the government banned people from using a student visa as a backdoor route to work in the UK, while noting that net migration was over 500,000 from June 2021 to June 2022.