Royal College of Nursing comments on minimum salary threshold report
Responding to the recommendation of the minimum salary threshold in the Centre for Social Justice report on immigration policy Dame Donna Kinnair, Chief Executive and General Secretary of the Royal College of Nursing said:
“Such a high salary threshold would prevent nurses and other health and care professionals from other countries being recruited to work here.
"International recruitment has always been a stopgap for long term vacancies and, as the Government hasn’t invested in the long term growth of the UK nursing workforce, the recruitment crisis will only worsen if nurses aren’t exempt.
"Even if the NHS is exempt, this change could be a barrier to ensuring overall workforce supply for the wider health and care sector, which also suffers high levels of staff shortages.
“The previous Home Secretary said he wanted to streamline the immigration process for highly skilled workers. The current immigration system, nurses tell us, is cumbersome and bureaucratic. It should be easier for immigrants and their employers to apply.
“Immigration reform is a complicated issue, especially with the current Brexit uncertainty, but patients are concerned that there are not enough nurses to care for them.
"If any future immigration system is to earn peoples’ trust, it must value the work of international nurses and allow them to keep working here, alongside much needed investment in the UK workforce.”
Ends
