Robert Hanson says attracting wealthy emigrants back to the city would help resolve the problems of an aging population and budget deficits

The Hong Kong issue has long been a political football for British lawmakers. It is becoming more obvious to even the most naive observer that the British government has at no time been genuinely concerned about the welfare of the people of Hong Kong. The United Kingdom government’s latest immigration white paper — Restoring Control Over the Immigration System — casts doubt on whether or not British National (Overseas) visa holders will be granted permanent residency in the UK after six years, as indicated when the BNO visa was issued. The UK government introduced the BNO visa for Hong Kong residents in 2021. Under the program, these visa holders are allowed to live, work, and eventually apply for citizenship after five years under the “5+1” pathway. By the end of 2023, approximately 220,000 applicants had been granted a BNO visa with the hope of gaining full UK citizenship after six years. Now they face the prospect of having to remain in the UK for 10 years instead.

While it is not yet clear whether this new 10-year requirement will directly apply to the BNO program, it is likely that this group of passport holders will be subject to much stricter criteria than originally anticipated. This is likely to present itself in one of two ways. One way would be to apply the 10-year requirement to the BNO scheme. Alternatively, the six-year requirement will be honored but come with specific conditions such as full-time employment in a key industry, earning a high salary, language requirements, a master’s degree or above, and being under the age of 40. In other words, the flexible bar is likely to be raised to a height few applicants will be able to scale.

These stricter immigration requirements arise out of several factors. The number of immigrants entering the UK is deemed too high by most UK citizens. In 2024, more than 1.2 million immigrants settled in the UK, which seems too many to accommodate or assimilate. Until recently, the number of immigrants entering the UK has been hidden from the public eye through two methods. First, by using the misleading term “net migration” to describe immigration. Net migration distorts immigration figures by subtracting from the number of immigrants the number of people leaving the country. It is misleading because if over a 10-year period 10 million indigenous British people leave and were replaced by 10 million non-British people, net migration would be zero. However, the culture of the UK has changed dramatically. A second tactic deployed by the UK government to stop any concerns about immigration being openly discussed has been — it is claimed in some quarters — to demonize any critic of immigration as a xenophobe, and this label carries negative implications for career prospects and even a possible prison sentence. Hence discussion and criticism of immigration had limited real public voice, until now.

Immigration is now a hot political topic after the anti-immigration Reform UK party secured 677 seats in the 2025 local elections compared to the pro-immigration ruling Labour Party which secured a mere 98 seats.

Prior to the emergence of Reform, Britons did not have such a high-profile public voice with which to openly criticize immigration. Now they do have a voice, and their pent-up anger has been released. Immigrants from Hong Kong expecting a welcome may well find themselves caught up in the rapidly growing anti-immigration backlash. This is a pity because Hong Kong people are hardworking, independent and not a burden on the state, unlike some of the new immigrants and thousands of asylum seekers living in the UK at the taxpayer’s expense.

The BNO scheme did not appear in any political party manifesto and yet the UK government lectures Hong Kong on democracy. The BNO scheme has limited public support and the electorate has never had the opportunity to vote on it. Politicians promoting it do not necessarily represent the will of the British people. It is questionable whether the BNO scheme has any political legitimacy or economic merit.

Middle class Hong Kong families initially felt great about the BNO scheme. They sold their apartments in Hong Kong and were able to buy a spacious detached house in the UK. The money raised from selling a 700-square-foot apartment in Hong Kong could be sufficient to purchase a four-bedroomed house with a garden, garage and a driveway capable of accommodating several cars in some areas in the UK. For a minority of the Hong Kong immigrants who moved to one of the UK’s more pleasant areas, life has, so far, been quite good, particularly for those with young children who benefit from excellent free primary and secondary schools. However they are in the minority. The majority of them have moved to major cities where knife crime, rapes, muggings and burglaries are at record levels. Some are waking up to the fact that the BNO scheme is not so great after all and that the UK is not the dream place they thought it would be. Some even feel that the UK has turned into a real-life nightmare.

Even well-off middle-class Hong Kong immigrants are seeing their savings diminish, while few jobs come close to generating the salaries they were earning in Hong Kong. Lawmaker Frankie Ngan Man-yu has argued that those struggling abroad should consider returning, emphasizing that Hong Kong offers better career prospects than the UK. Attracting wealthy emigrants and their young families back to Hong Kong would help resolve the twin problems the city currently faces, namely an aging population and budget deficits. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government should seize this opportunity to welcome them home and not replicate the cultural mistakes of immigration made by the UK government.

The author has a Ph.D, LL.M, and MA, and was called to the Bar of England and Wales in 1996. He is now a Hong Kong permanent resident.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.