A new statement of changes to the Immigration Rules: HC 1779.
A statement of changes to the Immigration Rules was published today, 11 December 2018. The main changes are to introduce the pilot scheme for short-term agricultural workers that was announced earlier this year and to expand the domestic violence settlement scheme to cover refugees. The more fundamental changes to Tier 1 announced last week — suspending and tightening up investor visas, replacing entrepreneur visas and introducing new start-up visas — are not taking place yet.
Mind you, the online file name of the statement of changes includes the term “Minus_T1_Suspension”, so clearly, the Tier 1 changes were supposed to be in there originally. See Home Office confirms chaotic U-turn on the suspension of Tier 1 (Investor) visas for an account of the farcical events of the past week.
Except where indicated otherwise, these changes come into force on 10 January 2019 and will apply to applications made on or after that date.