The SNP has welcomed the UK Government's decision to soften plans that would have required foreign care workers to wait up to 15 years before applying for permanent settlement.
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood had previously suggested that lower-qualified workers arriving on health and social care visas during the "Boriswave" from 2022 could have faced a wait of more than a decade as part of a wider immigration crackdown.
Under the revised plans published yesterday, foreign care workers who meet their visa conditions and earn at least £25,000 a year will now only have to wait five years.
Scottish Care Concerns
Scottish Care, which represents independent social care providers, had previously warned that the changes would deter "much-needed" international workers who have a "vital role".
More than 65 per cent of the organisation's members recruit staff from overseas, reflecting acute workforce shortages across the sector.
A report last year found that internationally recruited care workers made up nearly 100 per cent of the workforce in some parts of Scotland.
SNP Response
Indefinite leave to remain (ILR), also known as settlement, is an immigration status that allows a person to live, work and study in the UK indefinitely and apply for benefits if they are eligible.
Pete Wishart, SNP spokesman on Home Office affairs, described Labour's latest proposals as "costly and chaotic".
Wishart said: "The Home Secretary is hell-bent on forcing through these damaging reforms, whatever the cost to people in Scotland and across these isles."
"The SNP will not stand by while the Labour Party damages public finances, harms our economy, and throws health and social care workers under the bus just to chase after Reform UK."
"While it's positive that the Labour Party has scaled back its crackdown on health and social care workers – after criticism from all sides, including from the SNP – we need to see a full reversal of Labour's costly and chaotic proposals."
"Scotland can't afford a UK Labour Government dancing to Nigel Farage's tune. We deserve better than a Labour Party willing to sacrifice Scotland's economy, our public finances, and our health and social care workers for their own political purposes."
"Scotland and our communities, households and businesses need the hope that can only ever come with the fresh start of independence."
