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A committee of peers is to investigate whether the UK¡¯s immigration policies send ¡°unwelcoming messages¡± to non-European Union students, damaging universities¡¯ international performance.

The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee inquiry will look at whether immigration laws are preventing international students from choosing to study in the UK, and whether immigration rules have been communicated effectively. Also raised will be the issue of routes into work for non-EU students.

The enquiry will focus on STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects, and the committee is asking for written evidence on the issue from today until 20 February.

They are seeking recent data on student migration and the number of international STEM students at UK universities, as well as evidence as to whether methods of data collection and analysis have improved.

The announcement comes on the same day that new figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency showed the number of non-EU students at UK universities fell by 1 per cent last year, the first such decline ever recorded.