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Construction workers from abroad will still be able to migrate to the UK despite tighter visa restrictions announced by the government, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said, as Labour attempts to slash migration without damaging critical sectors of the economy.
Speaking to Parliament’s Home Affairs Committee on Tuesday, Cooper said officials had already identified a series of occupations that would not appear on the new Temporary Shortage List.
That list will allow employers to bring workers into the country who would not otherwise be eligible, because the job is classed as below degree level.
But the construction industry, and other sectors needed by the government to support its economic growth ambitions, will still appear on the list.
That will come as a relief to firms in the UK who worried that restricting the migrant workforce would hamper their business.
“Construction will continue to be on the Temporary Shortage List,” Cooper told lawmakers, adding that the industry would also have to develop a workforce strategy showing how it would train and recruit more British workers over time.
Roles “will only be able to go on the Temporary Shortage List if they are effectively in critical areas, for example, those that are critical to the industrial strategy or something like construction.”
Cooper’s reassurance to the construction industry comes just weeks after the government unveiled its immigration white paper, which set out a series of changes to the UK’s immigration system.
Most employers will now only be able to recruit from abroad for roles which are degree level or above, and workers will have to stay in the country for 10 years, rather than five, before they can apply for settled status.
Those restrictions were an attempt by Labour to stave off the anti-migrant Reform UK party, which has soared in popularity over the last year and won a slew of council seats in local elections last month.
Currently, the UK has an Immigration Salary List which allows employers to recruit from abroad for over 1,300 roles where there is currently deemed to be a shortage.
on that list means employers can recruit overseas nationals into those roles on a salary up to 20% below the general threshold.
Cooper said that system was too lax, and had contributed to the unprecedented number of migrants coming to the UK while providing no incentive for businesses to hire or train out-of-work Britons.
The white paper abolishes the current system to replace it with the Temporary Shortage List. Cooper said the government will cut up to 180 occupations from the current Immigration Salary List — but that would still leave more than 1,000 on it.
“We’ve already identified, as part of the immigration white paper, a series of occupations that will be taken off what used to be the immigration salary list,” Cooper said.
“The number of occupations on the temporary shortage list will besignificantly lower than the number of occupations currently on the immigration salary list.”
