January 2025 Migration Advisory Committee meeting minutes
Published 14 July 2025
© Crown copyright 2025
This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gov.uk.
Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.
This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/migration-advisory-committee-meeting-minutes-2025/january-2025-migration-advisory-committee-meeting-minutes
Migration Advisory Committee
2nd Floor, Peel Building NE
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF
183rd meeting of Migration Advisory Committee: minutes
Friday 24th January 2024 10:00 - 12:30
Virtual conference
Attending
Professor Brian Bell
Professor Dina Kiwan
Professor Sergi Pardos-Prado
Dr Madeleine Sumption
Professor Jo Swaffield
Della McVay
Holly White
MAC Secretariat
Agenda Item 1 – Welcome and introductions
Brian Bell opened the meeting and welcomed the attendees.
Agenda Item 2 – Home Office, MAC Secretariat and MAC updates
Della McVay gave an update on the new Immigration White Paper and a meeting with the Home Secretary.
Holly White provided a progress update on changes to the MAC framework agreement with the Home Office, spending review, the current IT/Engineering commission, and the Family Visa Income Requirements commission.
Brian Bell provided an update on meetings with the biggest sponsors of the IT/engineering sectors and Home Office ministers.
Agenda item 3 – Discussion with UKVI
Officials from UKVI joined for this item and provided an overview of visa data relating to the IT/Engineering commission, discussing demographics and sponsor compliance.
They gave an overview of Family migration, discussing visa numbers and trends in the data relating to the recent change to the Family Visa Income Requirements.
Agenda item 4 – Family visa financial requirements: family life definition
A member of the Secretariat laid out proposed definitions for the right to family life. These definitions are currently limited to immigration rules and legal definitions. The Committee were asked their view on whether any other definitions should be explored, such as those found in academic literature, and whether they agreed with using the current definitions.
Agenda item 5 – Family visa financial requirements: adequate maintenance scoping
A member of the Secretariat discussed a paper explaining adequate maintenance, and asked Committee their views on adequate maintenance as a requirement. They also asked Committee whether they agreed with the discussion around economic wellbeing and right to family life for adequate maintenance.
Agenda item 6 – Family visa financial requirements: Call for Evidence initial findings
A member of the secretariat asked whether the Committee had any thoughts on the initial findings from the Call for Evidence data, whether there were any particular subsets that should be analysed and whether they are happy with the current prioritisation of questions.
Agenda item 7 – Workplan
Holly White asked Committee to discuss the proposed workplan for the new team in the MAC.
Agenda item 8 – Net migration paper
Brian Bell asked Committee for their thoughts on additional analysis that could be included in the net migration paper.
Agenda item 9 – AOB
Brian Bell brought forward discussion of using the Annual Population Survey data responsibly, considering potential issues with sampling.