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<h1><span style="color: #0c3951;">The VOICE</span></h1><p><span style="color: rgb(12, 57, 81);">We are The VOICE: an action group of people on the 10-year route to settlement, supported by GMIAU. </span></p>

The VOICE

We are The VOICE: an action group of people on the 10-year route to settlement, supported by GMIAU.

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We are the VOICE.

We are an action group of people on the 10-year route to settlement, supported by GMIAU.

The 10-year route is an immigration pathway that requires us to renew our temporary leave to remain in the UK frequently, every 2.5 years, and pay high visa fees, until we have built up 10 years and can finally apply for indefinite leave to remain.

We are all Greater Manchester residents, and most of us have lived and worked in the UK for a long time. Some of us came here as children. We have British children and families, jobs in Manchester’s schools and hospitals, and a right to be here and stay. We are deeply rooted in our communities as mums, wives, neighbours, friends, and colleagues. But the 10-year route is a burden that prevents us from being truly settled.

As a group, we are speaking out about the anxiety and debt of saving for fees that keep going up. We’re talking about the housing and job insecurity we face because our status is temporary. We’re talking about the impact the 10-year route is having on our children, many of whom are British. And we are pushing back against being told we are not “integrating” and “contributing”. We know that it is the 10-year route holding us back from reaching our full potential.

Our asks

1. End the 10-year route and “earned settlement” policies.

All routes should be capped at 5 years.

2. Stop treating us as a cash machine.

We see this system as a form of modern slavery. End extortionate Home Office visa fees.

3. End the “no recourse to public funds” condition and stop all plans to punish people for accessing benefits.

Too many of us are struggling to afford basic necessities.

4. Make quicker decisions on our applications.

While we’re waiting for a decision, our lives are on hold and our mental stability suffers.

5. Stop using language like “strangers” to describe us.

Racism from politicians leads to racism on the streets, making us feel less safe in our homes.

6. Local authorities should support us as their residents, not cut us off from local support.

They must make sure their workers are well-informed about our rights and entitlements.

Our work

Since our group was set up in 2022, we’ve done a lot of work.

  • Members have contributed to national research projects, travelled to Parliament to speak to MPs, spoken at conferences and on panels.

  • We have spoken out against visa fee hikes and hostile government policies with statements and letters.

  • We’ve also campaigned locally, including providing training for local authorities based on our lived experience.

  • Our Community Organiser Fatou has shared candidly about her experiences running an action group - the challenges as well as successes. Read her blog about it here.

Earned settlement

In 2025 the government announced they were going to expand the 10-year route and make routes even longer for lots of people. We know all too well the harm caused by long and expensive routes.
We responded to the public consultation with our own experiences.

Tania, who works with The VOICE, went to London in March 2026 to be part of a mass lobby of Parliament against the earned settlement changes. She spoke for The Voice at a rally on Parliament Square. You can read about it here.

These policies appear to us to be designed with racist and classist stereotypes in mind, and so far away from those of us who are actually affected by it. These policies are discriminatory, particularly affecting those of us who are single parents and caregivers, which largely are roles held by women. The immigration system gets people into debt, and pushes them into situations which may negatively reflect on their “character”. How can the Home Office punish us for a situation it has pushed us into? We don’t believe that ‘integration’ is something that can be measured, as we can see from the Life in the UK test, which so many British-born people have no idea how to answer. This idea of ‘integration’ undermines our connection to our community and our lives in the UK, and feeds into the racist notion that we, as people of colour, do not belong here.These policies appear to us to be designed with racist and classist stereotypes in mind, and so far away from those of us who are actually affected by it. These policies are discriminatory, particularly affecting those of us who are single parents and caregivers, which largely are roles held by women. The immigration system gets people into debt, and pushes them into situations which may negatively reflect on their “character”. How can the Home Office punish us for a situation it has pushed us into? We don’t believe that ‘integration’ is something that can be measured, as we can see from the Life in the UK test, which so many British-born people have no idea how to answer. This idea of ‘integration’ undermines our connection to our community and our lives in the UK, and feeds into the racist notion that we, as people of colour, do not belong here.

Visa fees

We save and save for our visa fees – thousands of which are already pure profit for the Home Office. And now they want more.

We have spoken out against a number of visa fee hikes in recent years. In our 2023 statement, we said: we are angry to see the government try to further exploit us, profiting off our hard work while making our position in the UK feel less secure.

In 2025, we said: forcing us and our children to live in poverty, debt and insecurity makes all of our communities less safe.

We will continue to stand against visa fee exploitation and call for fees to be reduced to the cost of processing our applications.

Other work

Statement on racist riots

In 2024, we spoke out when racism erupted on our streets leaving many of us feeling unsafe in our homes. This is still ongoing with far right protests on our streets in 2026. We shouldn’t constantly have to justify our presence in this country, or be exceptional migrants, or work in roles helping other people. We just want to live our lives.

Our full statement

Influencing local authorities

In 2023 we launched our campaign on the 10-year route with a listening event with representatives from local authorities across Greater Manchester.

Read about it here

Contributing to policy and research

GMIAU’s policy and research work on the 10-year route to settlement could not happen without us, The Voice. You can read more about this work on the 10-year route campaign page.

10-year route campaign page

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