Safeguarding sponsored workers: A UK Workplace Justice Visa, and other proposals from a six-country comparison

As reports of exploitation increase, the situation for tens of thousands of migrant workers grows ever more urgent. Based on a six-country comparison and months of research, our new research spurred a coalition of over 130 migrants’ rights experts to write to the Home Secretary calling for action.

This government should give migrant workers more time to change employers, take tougher actions against sponsors, and institute a UK Workplace Justice Visa, if it's serious about extending the boost for workers' rights to foreign-born workers. Read on for our findings, what needs to change, and who’s backing this.

The UK’s visa sponsorship system is at risk of breaching international human rights obligations

Sponsorship, as it currently operates in the UK, risks breaching the UK’s international human rights obligations. This includes Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which states that no one shall be held in slavery or servitude, and no one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labour. 

Time and again clients disclosed being overworked or underpaid, or being coerced to undertake work that was entirely different from what was originally agreed. Similar situations of destitution, irregular migration status and the burden of large debts may also indicate potential breaches of Articles 3 (prohibition on torture, inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment) and 8 (right to respect for private and family life) of the ECHR.

The government’s response to date falls short

While successive UK governments have acknowledged the vulnerability of sponsored migrant workers, we found that policy solutions to date have focused too narrowly on the need for greater labour market enforcement and sector-level improvements, leaving wide protection gaps for workers. 

The Home Office has increased action against non-compliant sponsors, with the highest number of licence suspensions and revocations since Brexit. However, there is virtually no compensation for workers who have already been abused by their sponsors, and no measures to support them to report exploitation and rebuild their lives. 

The National Referral Mechanism, the existing framework for victims of modern slavery,  is also an inadequate framework. The NRM is too narrow, oversubscribed, and lacks the pathway to immigration status security that most people need.

Overall, we found that policy responses to date fall short of the UK’s positive duty in respect of Article 4, to put in place an appropriate framework to protect against exploitation and trafficking. 

Data and recommendations 

To tackle this crisis, we examined the immigration policies adopted by six other high-income countries in response to migrant worker exploitation. This includes Australia, Canada, Finland, the Republic of Ireland, New Zealand and the USA, all of whom operate employer-sponsored visa systems similar to the UK one.

See Table 1: A cross-country comparison of immigration provisions; and Table 2: A comparison of Temporary Permission for Victims of Human Trafficking or Slavery and a new UK Workplace Justice visa.

We argue that removing the visa tie to employers would most effectively safeguard migrant workers, by empowering them with the freedom to take their labour to the businesses that need and value them. Failing that, if the government is committed to retaining a work migration system based on employer-sponsorship, we argue that the UK should adopt a minimum of three measures to plug the gap in worker protections:

1. Introduce a UK Workplace Justice visa for victims of labour exploitation. All six countries we examined operated, with some variance, versions of an immigration route that recognises the injustice of migrant workers being exploited by a visa sponsor, and supports them to safeguard their immigration status, secure alternative employment and access remedy – with the strongest examples in Australia, Canda, and Finland. 

2. Extend the 60 day grace period between the end of employment and the curtailment of the visa, to empower all sponsored workers to leave abusive jobs. An extension to six months and freedom to work would match the provisions in Australia, and effectively codify the discretion the Home Office has already applied unofficially in some circumstances by not curtailing visas. 

3. Increase penalties for employers who abuse sponsorship. Introducing new penalties against employers for non-compliance could raise the stakes of exploitation, and help fund a much-needed worker compensation scheme.

Open letter to the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper

These recommendations were presented to the Home Secretary in an open letter signed by more than 130 organisations and lawyers, concerned that the UK’s visa sponsorship system is at risk of breaching international human rights obligations.

This includes a broad coalition of charities, law firms, and leading academics, including immigration barrister and founder of Free Movement, Colin Yeo, the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI), Focus on Labour Exploitation, and the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association (ILPA). 

Together, we reflected on the serious harm caused by the lack of worker safeguards in the UK, and called on Yvette Cooper to implement the three recommendations highlighted in the Work Rights Centre report to redress the power imbalance inherent in employer-sponsored visas.

At the time the letter was sent to the Home Secretary, we received 139 signatories, including 54 organisations, 52 lawyers, 33 other practitioners across law, civil society and academia. We continue to leave the letter open for signature to illustrate the ongoing harm experienced by migrant workers, the urgent need for immigration system reform, and the broad coalition of supporters of these reforms.  

Read the letter and add your support here