UK panel says migration earnings rules risk exploitation of care workers

Changes to the UKs migrant worker rules which allow public health-care staff into the country on a lower salary than private sector employees pose an increased risk of exploitation for care workers, according to a panel that advises the government...

The changes announced by Home Secretary James Cleverly in December created a widening divide between the public and private sector, according to a report on Friday from the Migration Advisory Committee, a group of independent economists and researchers who guide the government on migration policy...

The changes to the system, which will mean most skilled foreign workers will have to earn at least 38,700 ($49,100) in order to gain a UK visa, were designed to bring down the number of immigrants entering the country under government-approved routes..

But with the National Health Service exempted from the new earnings threshold, the MAC said the government appears to be exempting itself from any salary thresholds which would require an increase in pay for publicly funded workers...

This widening divide poses an increased risk of exploitation for lower-paid occupations, such as care workers, as the gap between salary thresholds for private and publicly funded occupations becomes larger, the MAC said in a report published Friday..

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