Draft Immigration Skills Charge (Amendment) Regulations 2020

Holly Lynch Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2020 General Committees

[Holly Lynch (Halifax) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mrs Murray. It is not often that immigration proves to be less contentious than the alternative debate that was perhaps being proposed by the Minister. I welcome being on solid footing with this draft statutory instrument this morning.

I thank the Minister for his opening remarks. As he is aware, we are certainly uncomfortable with elements of the immigration skills charge and, in particular, how it applies to NHS trusts as employers. I will take this opportunity to ask him once again to reflect on how the skills charge affects NHS trusts, with some hospitals paying back hundreds of thousands of pounds to the Government every year.

The draft regulations, as we heard, bring the definition of skilled worker within the immigration skills charge regulations in line with the Government’s new proposed points-based immigration system. Again the Minister knows, because we have been through this at some length during the passage of the immigration Bill, that we have broad concerns about how the Government define skilled workers, in particular in relation to social care. That is an issue that will return to the main Chamber next week, when we debate the Lords amendments to the immigration Bill.

The draft regulations, however, are incredibly tight in scope, so it would be futile to oppose them in isolation. We will seek to address those wider concerns at other more appropriate opportunities.

Question put and agreed to.