Migrant graduates who come to the UK using the controversial Graduate Route will soon be subject to yearly mandatory English tests under a new government-approved crackdown.
The Cabinet is set to approve the change in requirements to the scheme that allows foreign students to work here for two years.
The policy will also see universities and colleges with high dropout rates lose the ability to recruit prospective students from abroad.
On top of this, recruiting agents who lure foreign students away from their degrees and into low paying jobs, often giving them less than minimum wage, will also be taken on by the Home Office.
Government sources told the Sun that the new version of the Graduate Route scheme would only allow the ‘best and brightest’ to come to the UK.
The redesigned scheme comes days after it was revealed that Rishi Sunak is planning on banning British universities from allowing foreign students to take ‘low quality’ postgraduate courses, as part of his broader crackdown on immigration.
Concern that the courses are being used as a backdoor route into the UK have been growing.
Official figures this week are expected to show that although net immigration is falling from record highs, it still remains far above the level at the 2019 election, which the Conservatives pledged to reduce.
Sunak is said to be concerned that some universities are offering ‘low quality’ postgraduate courses to foreign students who are willing to pay in return for a visa that allows them to work for at least two years in the UK after completing their studies.
Government sources pointed to figures from HM Revenue and Customs showing that 41 per cent of those using the graduate visa to work were earning less than £15,000.
But any move to tighten the rules further will face resistance from senior Cabinet ministers – and a backlash from universities, which rely heavily on income from foreign students, who can be charged higher fees.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said on Friday that existing changes to the immigration rules were already cutting immigration and suggested there was no need to go further in limiting student numbers.
He said the Government would ‘continue to support sustainable increases in international students coming to the UK’.
Education Secretary Gillian Keegan has also indicated she would oppose moves to ban foreign students taking lower quality postgraduate degrees, saying: ‘This can’t all be about PPEs from Oxford.’
Their case was bolstered last week by a report from the Migration Advisory Committee, which found there was no evidence of ‘widespread abuse’ of the scheme.
Despite this, Whitehall sources confirmed the PM is examining options to ‘tighten’ the graduate route so that it is open to only the ‘brightest and the best’.
Reforms introduced earlier this year, including banning masters students from bringing family members with them, have already led to a sharp fall in applications.
But a No 10 spokesman said the PM ‘still thinks there’s further to go,’ adding: ‘We are committed to attracting the best and brightest to study at our world-class universities whilst preventing the abuse of our immigration system.’