Energy Secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh has repeatedly declined to say she supports Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood's plan to make some foreign workers wait 15 years for permanent residency, as Downing Street declined to rule out watering the proposals down.
Asked on Sky News on Wednesday morning whether she backed the extended wait, Fahnbulleh would not endorse it, telling presenter Sophy Ridge: "I 100% back Shabana Mahmood and everything she is trying to do, but there is a package of reforms."
The exchange deepens an open Labour dispute over immigration inside the cabinet. Downing Street declined on Wednesday to rule out changes to the plans, saying the government would set out its response "later this year".
Under the government's "earned settlement" proposals, the standard qualifying period for indefinite leave to remain, the status that allows migrants to stay permanently and is a precursor to citizenship, would double from five to 10 years. Sponsored workers in jobs below degree level, including those on Health and Care Worker visas, would face a baseline of 15 years, with reductions available for higher earners. Refugees granted asylum would face 20 years.
Ridge pressed Fahnbulleh several times. "Do you support the plans or not? It's my fourth time asking. Normally I hate these things where you ask the same question over again," she said.
Fahnbulleh replied: "We are consulting on the package of reforms that we'll put forward and the home secretary, as you can imagine, having looked at all the responses, will set out what the final position is."
She added: "I support reforms that say that people have to contribute and make a contribution to this country, in order to get citizenship." She said Mahmood had a "really tough job" and praised her for "getting a grip on small boat crossings".
The energy secretary, who came to Britain from Liberia as a child refugee, had already set out her reservations in writing. In a later-deleted post on her constituency website, first reported by the Telegraph, she wrote: "Ultimately, I want to see a system based on control and compassion, with a much stronger focus on integration."
Housing Secretary Angela Rayner said last month that applying the changes to people who arrived from 2021 amounted to "changing the goalposts". On Tuesday she played down talk of a rift and said she had "full confidence".
The Times has reported that Prime Minister Andy Burnham is considering exempting care workers from the longer wait, and that the Home Office opposes a carve-out. An ally of Mahmood told the paper that Burnham had been on her side throughout the row. Neither account has been confirmed on the record.
Earlier this year about 80 Labour MPs wrote to Burnham opposing the plans. "Targeting a group of migrants that followed the rules, and applying this retrospectively, does not pass the fairness test for a compassionate but firm system," the letter said, according to LBC. "We do not recall being asked on the doorstep to make it harder for migrant workers to settle in the UK."
The Migration Observatory estimates that more than 325,000 visas granted in care and middle-skilled jobs since 2021 would fall under the 15-year baseline.
Mahmood told Labour's conference she would "come to a position that balances fairness". A government source said that while the consultation was under review, "the final policy is not set".
The consultation, published on 20 November 2025, closed on 12 February. The government has not yet published its response. LBC and GB News have reported that the plans could be brought to Parliament as soon as next month.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has suggested her party could lend Labour votes to pass the measures, according to LBC.
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