Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Labour's Reform-lite policy threatens NHS
The paper says that Prof Nicola Ranger, the RCN general secretary, told them: “Health and care services would cease to function without migrant nursing staff. While other countries offer immediate paths to settlement for nurses, the UK is going in the opposite direction.”:
Labour is proposing to double the time that overseas workers will have to wait – from five to 10 years – before they can apply for indefinite leave to remain or claim any kind of benefit, including tax-free childcare, disability living allowance or housing support.
The plans, outlined by the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, at the Labour conference last week, would also mean foreign workers would have to volunteer in their local communities and pass a number of other existing tests to gain British citizenship.
The proposals were first outlined the government’s immigration white paper in May and are seen as a direct response to the rising electoral threat of Reform UK.
The RCN, which represents more than 500,000 nurses in the UK and overseas, said the policy would “deny people access to vital support for a decade or more, increase poverty and ultimately drive them away when there are already gaping holes in the workforce”.
Ranger, who is also the union’s chief executive, added: “These proposals are no way to treat people who come to the UK to care for patients, become part of our communities and pay tax.
“It is pandering of the worst kind, ignorant of the impact on valued migrant staff and their families, but also the patients who need safely staffed services. Yes, ministers need to grow the domestic workforce, but the UK must also be a welcoming, secure place for international nurses.”
More than 800 NHS workers criticised the plan on Monday as “harmful, divisive and xenophobic” and warned that the health service would “crumble” without them.
The plans have caused concern in several key public services – including the NHS, social care and prisons – which rely heavily on overseas workers. About one in five NHS staff in England are not British, according to official figures.
In a letter coordinated by the groups Praxis and Medact, the 800-plus medics said the “already strained NHS would crumble under the pressure” of these proposals, potentially triggering a staff exodus and discouraging overseas medics from working in the UK.
A social worker who spoke to the Guardian on condition of anonymity said 25-50% or more of his team would be likely to leave the UK if the government made it harder for them to gain citizenship. “The policy is foolish in terms of the impact it’s going to have on the NHS and [it’s] cruel on all the people it’s going to affect,” he said.
The letter says nurses, doctors, dentists and other NHS professionals are “deeply concerned” by Mahmood’s plans to impose “longer and more precarious” routes to settlement.
It turns out that the health service is no safer in the hands of Labour than it would be under the Tories or Reform.
