Care worker visa to close for overseas recruitment

THE Government is going to close the care worker visa for overseas recruitment as part of its immigration reforms, the Home Secretary has said.

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Yvette Cooper said rules around the visa will be changed to 'prevent' it being used to 'recruit from abroad, but that companies will still be able to recruit from a pool of thousands of people who came to the UK on care visas for jobs that did not exist.

Ministers are due to publish their Immigration White Paper today which will also include changes to skilled visa thresholds and tighter restrictions on recruitment for jobs on skills shortages.

Officials are looking to bring down net migration, which reached 728,000 last year, but ministers are not going to set an overall target, which Ms Cooper labelled as a 'failed approach.'