Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many foreign workers were brought into the UK to work on farms through Government-approved labour schemes in (a) 2016 and (b) 2017 to date.
The Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme (SAWS) was established to bring foreign workers into the UK to work on farms. SAWS was closed in 2013 when transitional restrictions on nationals of Bulgaria and Romania were lifted, enabling free movement of all EU workers. There were no Government-approved labour schemes in the UK for farm workers in 2016 or in 2017.