Refugee Family Reunion Changes Deemed “Cruel”

Teh government’s decision to end the automatic right to family reunion for people fleeing war, conflict and persecution creates “an additional level of cruelty” for refugees, a family therapist working with survivors of torture has told openDemocracy.

Shaheen Syedain, who works for Freedom from Torture, warned of the impact that Labor’s sweeping changes to the asylum system will have.

Under the previous rules, an individual who had been granted refugee status in the UK could apply for their family members to join them, which was one of the few safe and legal routes for people to travel to the UK to seek asylum.

But in September 2025, the government temporarily closed the family reunion route to new applications. Two months later, home secretary Shabana Mahmoud published a new asylum and returns policy, which aims to end the automatic right to family reunion. Going forward, cases will be assessed on an individual basis and will be linked to criteria such as earnings.

More than 20,800 people received refugee family reunion visas in the year ending June 2025, a 30% increase on the previous year. The majority were women and children, most of whom were arriving from Syria, Iran, and Afghanistan.

many of those who applied to bring their family over arrived in the UK via irregular means, such as crossing the Channel on a small boat. As the journey is so dangerous, young men often travel alone to claim asylum, before bringing their families over safely on the reunification visa.

The far right has increasingly stigmatised the young men who make this journey as “fighting age men”, with the suggestion being that they are a threat or an “invasion”. But the reality is many are teenagers struggling with th