Clampdown on immigration: Increased enforcement affecting all businesses
4th September, 2024
At the end of last month, further changes to the immigration system were announced by Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, with the headlines declaring a 'major surge' in immigration enforcement.
Employers need to be aware of these new changes, ensuring they have a solid understanding of the rules. Knowing the requirements around right to work, and sponsorship of employees for work visas is absolutely key. Employers must also be able to demonstrate that they are exercising care and caution when applying these rules.
These changes are being announced despite an increase in enforcement action since the beginning of 2023. Recently we have seen a sizeable increase in both suspensions and revocations of employers’ sponsor licences for the Skilled Worker visa, with the highest number on record of employers losing their licence. In Quarter 2 of 2024 there were more than 1,000 Skilled Worker sponsor licences either suspended or revoked, nearly twice as many than in Quarter 1. It is almost certain that we will see these figures increase for the rest of 2024 and onwards.
To put these numbers in to context, there are over 100,000 businesses in the UK that hold a sponsor licence, with. suspensions and revocations currently impacting approximately 1% of licence holders. While this is a small percentage, the consequences of a sponsor licence suspension or revocation can be devastating for businesses and those workers employed under Skilled Worker visas.
While the number of businesses needing to apply for and rely on sponsor licences increases at a significant rate (nearly 20% in the last quarter), the presence of the Immigration Enforcement team is more prevalent too.
In an effort to crack down on illegal working, the Home Office is actively investigating businesses across the UK. Immigration Enforcement teams have been making targeted visits to businesses who they suspect are employing workers illegally. Between 1 January and 31 March 2024, 411 penalties were issued, in respect of 532 illegal workers with the resulting fines totalling of £8m. This has ramped up significantly in recent weeks following the Home Secretary’s announcement. Between 18 and 24 August 2024, over 275 businesses were visited, resulting in 135 of them receiving notices for hiring illegal workers, putting them at risk of receiving a fine of up to £60,000 per illegal worker. Following this, the Home Secretary commented that “while this operation marks an important step forward, our commitment to tackling this issue is ongoing. We will ensure those who break the rules face the full force of the law.”
What are the changes?
The main focus of the changes is an increased scrutiny of right to work checks and illegal working.
Practically, the proposed changes to immigration enforcement are likely to include:
- Increased requests for information regarding suspected illegal workers, which could be both current and former members of staff;
- More civil penalty notices being issued costing employers up to £60,000 per illegal worker;
- An increase in other enforcement action in addition to illegal working fines, including closure notices, director disqualification and potential prosecution;
- A higher number of pre-licence visits (in person or remote) for businesses applying to become a sponsor licence holder
- More frequent audits for existing sponsor licence holders.
How should employers prepare for the increased enforcement?
With these new measures in place, it is critical that employers know how to carry out compliant right to work checks, are doing so, and are retaining evidence of these. Where there are doubts regarding an employee’s right to work employers need to act quickly to investigate. For example if an employee’s visa has expired but they state a new application is in progress, clear evidence is needed. If evidence cannot be found employers should give serious consideration to whether it is appropriate to terminate the employment. The risk of receiving an illegal working penalty, the harm this can cause to a business and the risk of being found to be knowingly employing an illegal worker (which is a criminal offence), need to be weighed against the risk of dismissing.
Employers should be actively reviewing their current practices to ensure they are in line with the requirements and considering updating procedures and providing training to staff involved in the right to work checking process.
For organisations that are sponsor licence holders, or would like to be, it is crucial for those managing the licence and the sponsored workers to have a sound understanding of their duties as a sponsor. Failure to abide by these responsibilities could result in the organisation having its licence suspended, downgraded or revoked, which would most likely prevent the business from continuing to employ its sponsored workers.
Please note that this briefing is designed to be informative, not advisory and represents our understanding of English law and practice as at the date indicated. We would always recommend that you should seek specific guidance on any particular legal issue.
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