EU mass immigration Part II: ‘Family Joiners’ – legal mass immigration without end
Over 1/4m ‘EUSS’ migrant applications approved from all over the world – and it continues
With Andy Burnham having opened another of his “conversations”, about Free Movement with the EU, in Part II of this ‘EU mass immigration report’, we expose what is arguably the most politically explosive element of the entire, post-Brexit, EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS).
In Part I we revealed that over 6 million applicants for UK residency have been approved by the Home Office under the Scheme. Continued research of Home Office files has produced this shocking report by Stand for Our Sovereignty, in collaboration with the Brexit Facts4EU think-tank, and The Campaign for an Independent Britain (CIBUK.Org). It has been shared exclusively with our friends at GB News.
A vital element of the EUSS which has received little scrutiny is referred to as the ‘Joining Family Members’ category. Unlike the main scheme, it has no statutory closing date. This route allows those with a connection to existing applicants to apply for permanent residency in the UK. This comprehensive report uncovers the staggering volume of these post-deadline entries, their surprising global composition, and the immense financial burden they place on UK taxpayers.
While public attention remains fixed on illegal boat crossings, and while the public believes the Brexit immigration gates shut for new EU arrivals in 2021, this ‘family’ route serves as a permanent, open-ended visa conveyor belt for hundreds of thousands of EUSS migrants – over one-third of them from outside the EU.
Andy Burnham boasts of immigration numbers coming down, but in the last year successful grants of Settled Status under this route have more than doubled.
The overview: Staggering total numbers
The sheer scale of the overall EUSS system remains completely unprecedented. Official Home Office datasets show the following.
The EU Settlement Scheme – totals so far
- 8,941,726 cumulative applications now processed, of which
- 8,837,667 applications have been decided, resulting in
- Circa 6.1 million applicants being approved
However, these headline numbers mask a troubling fact. The main scheme was originally publicised as a time-limited operation following Brexit. Rather than winding down, the system has transformed into a rolling, permanently-open backdoor.
Rt Hon Lord Redwood D.Phil FCSI, former Single Market Minister and former Secretary of State
commented exclusively to GB News, Stand for Our Sovereignty, and the Brexit Facts4EU think-tank
“8.65 million extra people coming to live in the UK this century is far too many. Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat Ministers have allowed more than 6.1 million to come from the EU, the big majority of the new arrivals. Romania and Poland led this movement.
“It has taken Facts4EU to reveal this uncomfortable truth that government has suppressed. Now they reveal the shocking news that the EU Family scheme is still being used to invite in many more, years after the Brexit vote to stop this.
“A third of the new visas are granted to people who originate outside the EU, using it as a stepping stone to living in the UK. Voters have voted in large numbers to say No to this, so why is the government spending billions of taxpayer money inviting the world to Hospitality Britain via this EU scheme?”
The post-deadline influx: ‘Family Joiners’ unmasked
The data becomes particularly concerning when isolating that cohort of joining family members who applied after the main transition window closed. Post-deadline, between 01 July 2021 and 30 June 2026, the Home Office has processed a colossal 637,306 family joiner applications. Out of these, caseworkers gave decisions on 618,613 files.
From that number, a grand total of 263,027 family applications were formally approved – a grant rate of 42.5%.
‘Family joiner’ application approvals overall
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The non-EU backdoor of the EUSS to the Rest of the World
Our deeper forensic dive into the nationality data contained in the massive number of Home Office files exposes a profound geopolitical shift. Traditionally, the EUSS was understood to be about the residency status of EU citizens who had moved across the Channel and settled in the UK, pre-Brexit.
What has not been generally known is that the ‘family reunification’ route is now actively being used by foreign nationals from outside the EU. The numbers are stark.
Former Brexit Minister the Rt Hon David Jones (now Reform UK)
comments exclusively to GB News, Stand for Our Sovereignty and Brexit Facts4EU on this report
“This important Facts4EU research shows that, years after the referendum, an immigration route created under the Brexit settlement is in fact open to people from across the world.
“More than 260,000 family joiner applications have been approved since June 2021. Over a third of those approvals were for nationals of countries outside the EU and EEA.
“Very few Britons who voted to leave the EU envisaged that an agreement on the rights of EU citizens would have consequences on this scale, extending so far beyond the shores of Europe.
“Britain is struggling to provide enough homes, infrastructure and public services for its existing population. Yet successive governments of all political colours have clearly been content to allow these arrangements to continue with little or no public scrutiny.
“Ministers must now come clean about how many more people may be entitled to enter under the scheme. If the Withdrawal Agreement prevents Britain from exercising proper control of immigration, a future UK Government must do whatever is necessary to restore that control.”
Out of the 263,027 total family joiner applications approved, 93,368 approvals were issued directly to non-EU and non-EEA global citizens. This means non-European nationals account for more than one-third (35.5%) of all successful family joiner applications so far approved post-deadline.
This proportion stands in direct contrast to the representation of non-EU citizens in the EU’s population as a whole.
The massive over-representation of approved applications from non-EU nationals
Where in the World are these approved EUSS migrants coming from?
From India in the East to Ecuador in South America, these global ‘family’ joiners of EU migrants are being approved under the EU-enforced ‘EU Settlement Scheme’. What has not been explained is why they represent such a high proportion (35.5%) of the EU’s ‘family joiners’.
According to the EU’s official statistics body, only 6.8% of the people living in the EU last year were non-EU citizens. It might be expected that ‘family joiners’ using this EU Settlement Scheme to enter the UK would be a similar proportion. Instead they represent over FIVE TIMES the percentage.
The EU Settlement Scheme – Top 20 non-EU countries
The £1.8 billion UK taxpayer bill… and counting
Processing this continuing mountain of paperwork comes at a significant cost. A hidden Home Office dataset, originally obtained by the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, has laid bare the system-wide expenditure. Over the last five financial years spanning 2020/21 to 2025/26, the department has spent £5.8 billion purely on making immigration and visa decisions.
Pro-rating this multi-billion-pound budget by transaction volume, the cost of the whole EUSS (not only family joiners) becomes more transparent. The scheme’s 8,837,667 concluded applications have accounted for 31.1% of the department’s total casework. The pro-rata share of managing this single scheme has therefore cost an astronomical £1.8 billion (£1,795,551,752) since 2020. And this £1.8 billion is only for the processing, not for the benefits all these people are no doubt receiving.
And on it goes…
With thousands of applications still sitting in the queue waiting to be processed, the system shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, the number of ‘Settled Status’ approvals of family joiners has doubled in the last year alone.
The Rt Hon the Lord Redwood D.Phil FCSI gave us his final comments
“Why are we short of homes? Why are we running out of water and electricity? Why can’t our sewage system cope? Why are so many young people without jobs? Why are NHS waiting lists so long?
“Build more houses, spend more taxpayer money, blame privatised water companies say the government. They ignore the elephant in the room.
“All these problems result from too many extra people needing homes, jobs and services. If our population were 7 million fewer by past control of our borders these shortages and problems would not have occurred.
“If we start today by stopping migration we would make it much easier to catch up with provision. If we stopped the illegals coming in we would save a fortune and remove worries in communities having to provide hostels.
“If we stopped this EU open borders scheme which has survived Brexit we could tackle these big issues.”
Observations
The family joiner route has effectively taken over the EUSS from its original post-Brexit deadlines. UK taxpayers are left funding an open-ended, multi-billion-pound bureaucratic machine that operates completely outside the spirit of independent border control.
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Please support our work
If more patriotic members of the public donate, we will keep going.
Please donate today to our research partner, Facts4eu, if you would like to continue reading us tomorrow, next week, and the weeks after.
[ Sources: Home Office ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.