Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what number of international students by university and by nationality who dropped out of university in the academic year 2024/2025.

Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

The Office for Students (OfS) publishes statistics across different aspects of the student lifecycle by higher education providers to help inform regulatory processes. The Student Outcomes Data Dashboard is accessible here: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/data-and-analysis/student-outcomes-data-dashboard/data-dashboard/. The dashboard holds the following indicators:

• Continuation: the percentage of first degree entrants who continue their studies after 12 months for full-time students, or 24 months for part-time students.
• Completion: the percentage of first degree entrants who completed their course within 4 years 15 days for full-time students, and within 6 years 15 days for part-time students.

The OfS publish breakdowns for non-UK domiciled students for English OfS registered providers. The latest data available are for 2022/23 entrants for continuation rates and 2019/20 entrants for completion rates. The student outcomes dashboard is updated annually and was last released in August 2025. The data can be accessed here:

https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/data-and-analysis/student-outcomes-data-dashboard/get-the-data/.

Data on student nationality as opposed to domicile, which is the permanent address of the student immediately prior to study, is not published by the OfS and is not readily available.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for the number of (a) enforced and (b) voluntary asylum-related removals in 2025 for all nationalities.

Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)

The Home Office publishes data on returns in the ’Immigration System Statistics quarterly release’. Data on enforced and voluntary asylum-related returns in 2025 can be found in Ret_05 with a further breakdown by top 10 nationalities in Ret_04 of the ‘Returns summary tables’.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential implications for her policies of potential foreign state ideological influence operating through student networks affiliated to UK universities.

Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)

This government is committed to freedom of speech and academic freedom within the law, but those freedoms do not extend to behaviour that constitutes extremist intimidation, harassment and incitement to hatred.

The National Security Act 2023 introduced offences of foreign interference which target malign activity carried out for, on behalf of, or intended to benefit, a foreign power.

In addition, the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme, applies to UK universities and students. Any person conducting political influence activity at the direction of any foreign country, or being directed by the Russian or Iranian states to conduct activity in the UK, must register.

We are committed to ensuring our universities remain free from interference. We announced a new Academic Interference Reporting Route and issued guidance at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/protecting-uk-higher-education-from-foreign-interference to help students and staff identify and escalate issues.

We will be investing £3 million to bolster support and advice on foreign interference for the sector.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what was the number of international students by university and by nationality who dropped out of university in the academic year 2024/2025.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

The Home Office does not currently publish data on the number of student visas issued for individuals attending specific universities, nor does it provide information regarding students who fail to complete their course.

Information on Home Office Entry Clearance Student visas can be found in the Immigration system statistics data tables - GOV.UK.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether she has conducted a risk assessment of fully online English language testing for migrants seeking to come to the UK.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

The Home Office has carefully considered the risks of a remote delivery model as part of the procurement to replace current Secure English Language Testing arrangements.

The key risks centre on maintaining the integrity and security of the immigration system, including identity assurance, protection against impersonation, and confidence in the reliability of test results. The Home Office has engaged the market to understand what capability is available to maintain high standards of security and integrity and has developed a robust security schedule and solution requirements to ensure this remains at the heart of the digital by default solution.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has conducted (a) an evaluation and (b) risk report on the potential of cheating within fully remote English language testing for migrants.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

The Home Office has carefully considered and evaluated the risks of a remote delivery model as part of the procurement to replace current Secure English Language Testing arrangements. This evaluation has informed the development of the Department's security requirements and procurement approach.

Any delivery model must meet appropriate integrity requirements and principles including data security, cyber security, accessibility, fraud risk, and prevention to ensure compliance with Home Office Policy and ensure that the service delivers the fundamental principles underpinning our Immigration policies and our visa journey. This compliance will be assessed throughout the tender process to ensure the strictest compliance with Home Office security parameters.

The ongoing Home Office English Language Test procurement is explicitly designed to test bidders' ability to meet these standards, and the Department will adopt only those solutions that demonstrably maintain the high level of assurance required.