A government fund to find new roles for overseas care staff left without work due to “large-scale non-compliance” with immigration rules by employers has been renewed for another year.
However, the international recruitment regional fund has been cut by 40% annually – from £12.5m to £7.5m – and the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has said that 2026-27 will likely be its last year.
Launched in 2023-24, initially to boost international recruitment, the fund’s focus switched in 2024-25 to tackle the problem of overseas staff being unable to work because their employers’ immigration sponsorship licence had been revoked due to non-compliance with the rules.
In several cases, this was as a result of staff being exploited, for example, through illegal recruitment fees, debt bondage – where people work for little or no money to pay off a debt – or wage underpayment.
In other cases, employers had struggled to manage the complexities of recruiting from abroad or were not aware that certain practices fell foul of the rules, leading to their licences being revoked.
How international recruitment fund must be used
As in previous years, the DHSC will channel funding through 15 regional and sub-regional partnerships of councils and care provider associations, with the money allocated based on the number of non-EU nationals from overseas working in each area.
The department said it expected the money to fund:
- mailboxes for displaced workers seeking new employment and providers interested in employing them;
- an employment support service for these staff, providing support with CV writing and interview skills and to facilitate job introductions with prospective employers;
- the signposting of displaced workers to relevant services, such as immigration advice, housing or health and wellbeing support
- proactive engagement with providers to raise awareness of displaced workers;
- the sharing of best practice between regional partnerships.
The funding will be allocated in two tranches, with the first slice coming this month and the second in October, with the latter contingent on partnerships demonstrating that they had used the first to meet the fund’s objectives.
Ban on overseas recruitment of care workers
The cut in the value of the fund and signalling that 2026-27 will be its last year follows the ban on providers recruiting care workers and senior care workers from abroad on health and care worker visas, which took effect in July 2025.
The number of health and care worker visas issued to migrant workers in a caring personal service occupation fell by 67%, to 3,172, between 2024 and 2025, with a particularly sharp fall in the second half of the year after the ban came into force, according to Home Office data.
Adult social care providers may continue to recruit staff who were hired on health and care worker visas but who have been displaced from their roles due to employer non-compliance, as well as people who have come to the UK through a different route, such as a student or graduate visa.
However, the government has said that these permissions will be for a time-limited period.
