Foreigners claim £1bn a month in benefits
Benefits claims by households with at least one foreign national have doubled to nearly £1 billion a month in the past three years, government figures show.
Households with at least one claimant who is a foreign national received £941 million in March this year, up from £461 million in March 2022, representing nearly a sixth of the month's Universal Credit payments.
The figures are likely to reinforce calls for restrictions on benefits for migrants, which Angela Rayner, the Deputy Prime Minister, urged Rachel Reeves to consider in a leaked memo seen by The Telegraph.
Ms Reeves, the Chancellor, is already facing a growing backbench rebellion over her plans to cut welfare spending. Funding two months of benefits for households with foreign nationals cancels out the £1.4 billion the Government saved by axing winter fuel payments.
Experts suggested the increase reflected a surge in the number of asylum seekers being granted refugee status and in net migration.
Foreign nationals become eligible for Universal Credit and other benefits on the same terms as British citizens once they are granted either indefinite leave to remain or refugee status.
Writing in The Telegraph, Neil O'Brien, a former Tory health minister who uncovered the data, said: 'The growth of benefit spending and the rate of migration are both much too fast, and the Government is doing far too little to change either trend.
'Migrants know that if they can make it to the UK, they will be allowed to stay. As long as that is true, we'll see more and more coming. Our soft-touch welfare state makes this worse.'
Graham Stringer, a senior Labour backbencher and former leader of Manchester City Council, said that such vast spending on foreign claimants should not be a priority.
He said: 'Given the state of the country's finances, everything has to be looked at and reassessed. This expenditure [on foreign claimants] in my opinion is not a priority.
'We have to be absolutely clear on what our priorities are and in my view these people are not a priority. It has to be judged against potential cuts in PIPs [Personal Independence Payments] and the winter fuel allowance and other benefits that may be cut for British citizens.'
The Telegraph revealed earlier this month that Ms Rayner told Ms Reeves to consider making it harder for immigrants to gain access to Universal Credit, by raising the fee they must pay for using the NHS and restricting their access to the state pension.
Ms Rayner's memo warned that, because of the high rates of immigration in the early 2020s, there would be an increase in the number of people becoming eligible for indefinite leave to remain, entitling them to state benefits.
The data, obtained for the first time under freedom of information laws from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP), shows that the amount of Universal Credit being claimed by foreign nationals has risen by nearly 30 per cent in a year, from £726 million to £941 million in March.
This accounted for 15.5 per cent of the total £6.05 billion payments of Universal Credit that month, up from 14.1 per cent in March 2022 but down slightly since when Labour won the general election in July last year.
The rising costs follow soaring net migration, which after Brexit reached a record high of more than 900,000 in 2023.
The DWP defines a foreign claimant as a non-Common Travel Area (CTA) national – someone who does not hold British or Irish nationality. Its analysis only included payments to households that are made to 'claimants who have a non-CTA nationality and have passed the Habitual Resident Test (HRT).'
HRT checks that an individual has a right to reside in the UK and is 'factually habitually resident' in the UK.
The DWP said joint claims that include at least one non-British or Irish national will be classed as foreign, even if other members of the household are British nationals.
Sir Keir Starmer announced a crackdown on net migration earlier this month that included proposals to extend eligibility for indefinite leave to remain from the current five years to 10 years, effectively denying tens of thousands access to benefits for longer.
Under his plans, migrants will only be able to 'earn' citizenship earlier if they can show a 'real and lasting contribution' to the economy and society.
It comes as Reform seeks to capture its first seat in Scotland in a by-election in Hamilton by capitalising on its plans for net zero immigration and restoring the winter fuel allowance.
A government spokesman said: 'We inherited a spiralling benefits system that was out of control. Since last July, we have reduced the proportion of benefit payments to nationals outside the British Isles.
'Refugees and non-UK or Irish citizens can only access these payments once their immigration status is formally verified by the Home Office, and they satisfy strict tests.'
By Neil O'Brien
The soaring bill for Universal Credit payments to people from overseas is the tip of the iceberg. Universal Credit only accounts for about half of working age welfare spending, and the DWP is so far refusing to release the same data for other benefits.
And cash benefits are only part of the story. For example, around half of all the council housing in Greater London is occupied by households where the head of the household was born abroad. Of these tenants, around a half are in work, and a half are not.
Many of those who commute a long way into the capital, paying a fortune to stand on a crowded tube or train, wonder whether it is fair.
For those who have paid in their taxes, it is frustrating to see others who have newly arrived in the country able to access benefits and services without having paid in.
The growth of benefit spending and the rate of migration are both much too fast, and the Government is doing far too little to change either trend.
Keir Starmer promised to 'smash the gangs', but the number of people crossing the channel is up nearly a third compared to the same period last year. We recently saw a record smashed for the largest number crossing illegally in one day. Having promised to close migrant hotels, the Government has opened more.
Starmer was warned by experts like the former head of Border Force, Tony Smith, that simply trying to improve enforcement would fail, unless factors that pull migrants here are addressed.
Migrants know that if they can make it to the UK, they will be allowed to stay. As long as that is true, we'll see more and more coming. Our soft-touch welfare state makes this worse.
Every week there is some new example of the abuse of human rights law to allow dangerous people to stay in the UK. A Ugandan murderer who clubbed a man to death in the back of a London ambulance wasn't deported because it would be bad for his mental health. A Pakistani paedophile won the right to stay because he risks being persecuted for his crimes back home.
There are 17,428 foreign national offenders living in the UK whose deportation the Home Office considers to be in the public interest, but who have not been deported, and the figure just keeps rising.
Meanwhile, spending on sickness and disability benefits is forecast to grow to £100 billion by the end of this parliament, double the rate of 2008.
Despite this, the present Government has abandoned plans to tighten the Work Capability Assessment, which means 400,000 more people will be signed off as unfit to work. The Government has also trailed plans to spend a further £3.5 billion a year removing the two-child cap on benefits.
Both the explosion of welfare spending and the surging numbers arriving in small boats are driven by the same rights culture. Sadly, we have a PM who is a human rights lawyer, who used to sign letters opposing the deportation of criminals. As long as he's in office, the bills for those who play by the rules will just keep on rising.
Neil O'Brien is the Conservative MP for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston and is a shadow education minister
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