Antonina, a 35-year-old Kyivan displaced by the Russian invasion, spent one year on her sister’s living room couch in London, suitcases ready for the day she could finally return home.
Like many Ukrainian refugees, she could not foresee she would still be here three years later, holding down several jobs to rent an apartment for herself and her seven-year-old daughter Teia — by now a fluent English speaker.
“I know that many people live [in Kyiv], including my own parents,” said Antonina. “But I wouldn’t go with my daughter, I don’t want her to experience air raids.”
But despite the war continuing in full force the UK government — which extended a generous welcome to Ukrainians after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022 — is beginning to pare back some of its support.
Antonina and Teia are among more than 200,000 Ukrainians who have arrived in the country since war broke out on emergency three-year visa schemes that will begin to run out in the coming months. Women and children account for more than three-quarters of arrivals, Home Office data shows.
In a scheme that opened on Tuesday, Ukrainians already living in the UK can apply for an extension four weeks before their documents expire, granting them a further 18 months.
This has prompted many of the hundreds of thousands of people who have grown used to life in the UK to weigh up their future and the question of whether to return.
“I know that especially people from the eastern regions of Ukraine are scared to go back home,” said Artem, a 34-year-old man from Kharkiv, whose city stands 20 kilometres from the north-eastern border area occupied by Russian forces, and is still a frequent target for missile strikes.
Even when the war ends, he said it will take time before his family could think of returning: “Kharkiv is so close to Russia that if something goes wrong we will once again be the first ones to take the hit, and I am just not ready to run away from war again.”
Almost 70 per cent of Ukrainian nationals surveyed by the Office for National Statistics last spring said they would like to remain living in the UK in the long term.
The number of visa extension applications, which are set to hit the UK Home Office between April and July — three years on from when most Ukrainians arrived in 2022 — has raised concerns from councils and Ukrainian charities over possible bottlenecks that could leave some people without documents for prolonged periods.
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“Some people are having issues already,” said Petro Rewko, chair of the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain. “They can’t sign new tenancy agreements because their visa runs out in the next few months, and same with new employment contracts.”
The visa deadline comes as Westminster cuts funding for its flagship Homes for Ukraine scheme, which connects Ukrainian refugees with British hosts, in return for a bursary.
Known as “thank you payments”, councils pay £500 a month for those willing to house a Ukrainian family for more than a year, but from April this will drop to £350 a month.
The amount the UK government pays councils has dropped to £5,900 for each Ukrainian person arriving under the scheme, well below the £10,500 paid when the programme was launched in 2022.
“As the visa schemes were designed to provide temporary sanctuary, the funding arrangements for councils to support arrivals need urgent review,” said Louise Gittins, chair of the Local Government Association.
The Home Office did not comment.
The government has also reduced routes for new Ukrainian arrivals to the UK, tightening the eligibility criteria for Britons wishing to host and scrapping the scheme that allowed Ukrainians to join their family members in the UK.
Maryna Ivaniuk, immigration lawyer at Westland Mark Limited, noted there has been a change in the application processing times. “At the start of the scheme, they would give out visas in a day or two, whereas now it can take up to a month and a half to go through all the checks.”
Uncertainty about their future in the UK has prompted many Ukrainians to take the matter of their immigration status into their own hands.
A growing number have been inquiring about eventual naturalisation, which takes between six and 11 years — the current emergency visa schemes do not count towards this. Those who have found partners in the UK are looking into spouse visas, while others want to apply for work sponsorship.
“I am sure there are people who want to go home and are just waiting for the war to be over,” said 30-year-old Pavlo, who moved to Liskeard in Cornwall on the Homes for Ukraine scheme almost three years ago.
“But I think most of us would want to stay, especially those who have found themselves here, who got a job and are building some sort of future . . . It is very sad but for me personally, the quality of life is better here than in Ukraine.”
Some Ukrainian men of conscription age hesitate to return as they may be called up for military service.
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Official data shows there has been a surge in Ukrainians working in the UK, rising from 1,400 in March 2022 to 57,250 in September 2024, with most of these workers living in either London or the south east of England.
A separate survey by the ONS showed that 69 per cent of Ukrainian adults in the UK either had a job or were self-employed by April 2024, a steep increase from 19 per cent in June 2022.
But the prospect of a more stable work visa is out of reach for many Ukrainians, said Artem, who came to the UK with “zero English” and now works as a hotel porter in London, while his wife does room service. “You’d need to be in IT or web-design, or some other high paying job, which leaves many people out.”
Pavlo, who has been working at a pipe-making factory in Plymouth since he came to the UK, said his salary was no longer enough to make the minimum threshold for skilled worker visa sponsorship after the government lifted it from £26,200 to £38,700 last year.
“Typically someone who is really keen to stay and doesn’t want to go back to a difficult situation is going to accept less,” said Sarah Khawaja, solicitor at law firm Burlingtons.
Pavlo said he had been putting off making much wanted changes to his life, including bringing his nine-year-old son to the UK from the Czech Republic.
“I don’t know what will happen after the visa extension runs out, I can’t make any plans,” he said. “At the moment I am in limbo”.
Additional reporting by Christopher Miller in Kyiv
