CAMPAIGNERS slammed the government today for its “racist and classist policy” of hiking the earnings threshold for bringing foreign family members to live in Britain.

Ministers announced on Thursday that they will raise the amount from £18,600 to £29,000 in spring, reducing a threat made earlier this month by Home Secretary James Cleverly to make it £38,700. 

Home Office minister Lord Sharpe of Epsom announced the government had cut back its plans, realising that the current threshold allows 75 per cent of the British working population to bring family members over, but a £38,700 threshold would limit that to 30 per cent.