The Government has approved this Tuesday in Council of Ministers a reform of the regulation of the law on foreigners with the aim of aims to regularize 900,000 persons migrants in the next three years at a rate of 300,000 each year. The regulatory change promoted by the Executive will also extend the duration of visas for seeking employment, create two new types of residence permits based on roots and relax the requirements for the regrouping of families of migrants with Spanish nationality.
This is the fourth reform of this regulation undertaken by the Government since 2018. The previous three focused on students, accompanied minors and the creation of the figure of arraigo. Now, the Executive is launching a new modification that will once again puts the focus on the incorporation into employment of people in an irregular situation. In the words of the Minister in charge of Migration, Elma SaizThis is the “most comprehensive and ambitious” reform that has been carried out since this regulation was created in 2011.
First, the Government has revamped the residence visa system and has given it a specific section within the regulation. All visas will now have a standard duration of one year and renewals will be for four years. Regarding the job search modality, those who receive the visa will be able to reside in the country while looking for a job for one year, instead of the three months that the previous regulation had established.
Second, the Executive Branch has acted on the concept of arraigowhich allows residence permits to be obtained under exceptional circumstances. In this section, three new situations of “arraigo” are created: socio-labor, socio-training and second chance. In addition, the length of stay that must be accredited in order to be eligible for the arraigo is reduced to two years in all cases and will allow the migrant to work both as a salaried employee and as a self-employed person from the first moment.