As the government approaches almost three months in power, it has started to share further details on its pre-election promise to reduce the UK’s reliance on overseas labour and bring net migration down. 

In a recent announcement by the Home Secretary, it was confirmed that the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) will undertake annual assessments which are targeted at the sectors considered to be reliant on overseas labour (the first two areas under the spotlight are IT and Engineering) in order to inform the next steps needed to reduce this dependency (including by investing in workforce training in the UK). 

The Home Secretary also referred to a ‘clamp down’ on existing sponsors to stop abuse of the immigration system, including increased compliance visits and the suspension or revocation of licences – this is in line with the trend that we have already seen increasing over the last this year in any case so it will be interesting to see what impact any new measures will have. 

If you have any questions on what this will mean for your organisation, including how you might prepare for a visit from the Home Office, please do get in touch.