Most immigrants can only access benefits in rare circumstances and must be granted permission to do so by the Home Office. We are concerned that penalising people in difficult circumstances who urgently need support will deepen poverty and increase pressures on local authorities. It would be deeply unfair to apply the penalty to people who have already been granted access to public funds and would not have known that this could extend their route to settlement. Doing so would also make implementation more practically difficult. (Conclusion, Paragraph 88)