Non-EU doctors and nurses to be excluded from UK visa cap

The UK government is to exclude skilled non-EU workers, specifically doctors and nurses, from the visa cap set in 2011 by Prime Minister Theresa May when she was Home Secretary.

The limit for all non-EU skilled workers is set at 20,700 by the cap. NHS bosses however, argue that the limit is too restrictive and makes it difficult to recruit much-needed staff. The current Home Secretary, Sajid Javid, who has previously acknowledged the recruitment problems facing the NHS, is therefore expected to confirm on Friday that more foreign doctors and nurses will be allowed to work in the UK.

Think tank Global Future state that foreign staff currently comprise 12.5% of NHS England’s employees. The Financial Times however, reported that 2,360 visa applications by non-EU doctors were declined because of the cap, whilst NHS England had 35,000 nurse vacancies and 10,000 doctor vacancies unfilled in February.

Alp Mehmet, Vice Chairman of the think tank Migration Watch, warned that this is not a long-term solution to the skills shortage facing the NHS, saying “what we must not forget to do is train our own medical staff.”

Indeed, IZA World of Labor author Massimiliano Tani writes that although making concessions for skilled immigrants “succeeds in selecting economically desirable immigrants” it also “cannot fix short-term skilled labor shortages.”

Amelie F. Constant argues however, in her article Do migrants take the jobs of native workers? that, “high-skilled immigrant workers complement physical capital and technology and the human capital of both low- and high-skilled native workers.”

Read more articles on migration policy and the labor market.