Moving the Goal Posts

David is a care worker for adults with learning disabilities. He came to England from Nigeria in 2022 with his wife as the Conservative government turned to migration to tackle the social care recruitment crisis. Since then, while working long shifts on less than £13 an hour, he says, “we have built relationships, we have put down roots – we have built a network”.

Under Labour’s immigration plans, David is one of more than 300,000 people who work in social care, and in some other low-income roles, who could now face a 15-year wait to be allowed to make a permanent life in the UK. Throughout the application process, he was told that, after five years, he could qualify for indefinite leave to remain (ILR), freeing him from the employer that sponsored his visa. But Labour now wants to tear up that promise. 

“Forcing a care worker to wait fifteen years before getting indefinite leave to remain is clearly wrong and unfair.” Said Elizabeth Brame.

 While workers wait for settlement, they remain tied to a single employer: a situation in which they have little bargaining power, and are vulnerable to exploitation.  

Net migration across the economy has plunged, but the Home Office’s plan is that for most future arrivals the baseline qualification period for ILR should be a decade. That means at least 10 years paying taxes, visa fees and an annual levy to use the NHS (£1035 for adults), with little or no opportunity to move between employers and progress.

7% of jobs in the care sector are still unfilled (down from 10% a few years ago, largely due to care workers from overseas). Ultimately, the presence of so many migrant care workers in the UK is the result of successive governments’ failure to build a properly funded social care sector.  

Elizabeth commented, “The Home Secretary, like the Conservatives and Reform UK, is trying to sound tough on Immigration. However, care workers like David came at the government's request to work hard for low wages in a vital under-staffed service. Liberal Democrats believe that they are being treated very unfairly and that those who came after being promised that they could stay permanently after five years should not be exploited to prop up the welfare system."