A young person applying for jobs and getting nowhere deserves a serious answer about opportunity. An employer unable to recruit the skills needed to keep a business growing deserves one too.
The question is whether tightening UK immigration rules connects those two problems. Sometimes it may. But restricting an overseas appointment does not establish who will fill the vacancy, whether they can do the work, or whether the employer will continue offering it.
Our view is that Britain should expect more investment in its own workforce. Immigration policy can support that objective. Its success should be judged by the opportunities people can actually access.
What the employment figures actually show
Analysis published by the Centre for Social Justice on 13 October 2026 puts the increase in payroll jobs between 2014 and the end of 2025 at approximately 3.7 million. Around 734,000 of that increase was in the UK-national category, compared with approximately 2.5 million in the non-EU category and 408,000 in the EU category.
Those figures deserve attention. However, a change between two payroll totals is different from a record of every recruitment decision during that period. It reflects jobs entering and leaving the totals. It does not establish that employers rejected British candidates for four out of every five vacancies.
There is also an important qualification in HMRC’s methodology. Nationality is recorded when an individual registers through the adult National Insurance number process and is not subsequently updated following a change of citizenship. Someone who later becomes British can therefore remain in a non-UK category. The figures count payroll jobs, so a person with several jobs can appear more than once; self-employment is excluded.
These limitations affect the conclusion we can draw. The data raises questions about participation in employment. It cannot, on its own, tell us how many British applicants were displaced by newly recruited overseas workers.
Nor is nationality a reliable guide to whether someone needs sponsorship. People with indefinite leave to remain or status under the EU Settlement Scheme, for example, do not require Skilled Worker sponsorship. Treating every non-British employee as a recent sponsored arrival misidentifies the policy being debated.
What UK work visa rules already require
An employer cannot establish Skilled Worker eligibility simply by saying that a vacancy is difficult to fill.
The Immigration Rules require an authorised sponsor, an eligible role, the applicable salary and other requirements to be met. They also provide safeguards against jobs that do not exist, are a sham, or have been created mainly to obtain immigration permission.
There is no general resident labour market test requiring Skilled Worker employers to advertise first and demonstrate that no suitable settled worker is available. Home Office guidance nevertheless requires sponsors to retain evidence of recruitment activity, or explain how they recruited someone where the role was not advertised.
That distinction matters. A discussion about introducing stronger domestic recruitment requirements is a policy debate. It should begin with an accurate account of the existing controls and the evidence that any additional requirement would improve hiring outcomes.
The rules have already changed substantially. Since 22 July 2025, sponsorship has generally required graduate-level work, with specified exceptions and transitional arrangements. This concerns the job’s skill level, rather than a universal requirement for the worker to hold a degree. New overseas entry applications for care workers and senior care workers were closed, while qualifying applications from within the UK remain possible.
Any further reform should therefore assess the effects of those changes, alongside the wider employment picture.
Our view: employers should invest in domestic talent
There is a legitimate concern behind calls to reduce reliance on overseas recruitment.
Where an employer repeatedly recruits experienced workers internationally but creates no meaningful route for people locally to learn the work, it is reasonable to question the long-term plan. A persistent shortage should prompt examination of training, pay, progression and retention.
The same scrutiny should apply to government. Encouraging employers to recruit domestically means ensuring that relevant courses, placements and employment support are available. Announcing an ambition to reduce migration does not establish who will fund the training or when qualified workers will become available.
At Knightsbridge, we would support a closer connection between immigration policy and credible workforce development. The important word is credible. A training commitment should identify what people will learn, who will supervise them and how it can lead to sustained employment.
Employers should be able to explain how today’s recruitment decisions fit their future staffing needs. Government should be equally clear about the support behind its expectations.
A vacancy only helps someone who can take the job
The difficulty with treating worklessness as an immediately available workforce is that people face different barriers.
ONS distinguishes unemployment, which involves actively seeking work and being available to start, from economic inactivity, where those conditions are not met. A broad count of people outside employment cannot be treated as a list of candidates ready for any available role.
Consider someone who could return to work with predictable hours and a manageable journey. If the vacancy requires rotating shifts in a place they cannot reach, restricting an overseas hire leaves the practical obstacle unresolved.
Another person may need treatment, adjustments or a gradual return after illness. A school leaver may need an employer willing to provide initial training. An experienced worker may need a short conversion course rather than a complete apprenticeship.
These situations require different responses. The useful question is what would enable this person to take this job and remain in it.
Immigration restrictions can change an employer’s recruitment options. Their ability to improve domestic employment depends partly on whether those practical barriers are addressed.
Higher wages and better conditions belong in the discussion
Employers should also examine what they are offering before concluding that recruitment is impossible.
If a role attracts few suitable applicants, the explanation may involve pay, working hours, location, excessive experience requirements or limited progression. Repeated staff departures should prompt questions about why people leave.
Tighter access to overseas recruitment may encourage some employers to improve the offer. That is a plausible policy mechanism worth examining. It should not be presented as an automatic result.
An employer might instead reduce opening hours, postpone expansion, automate part of the work or decide that a proposed service is no longer viable. Which response occurs will depend on the business, its customers, costs and available alternatives.
A serious assessment should examine those possibilities sector by sector. It should also distinguish a shortage of trained people from a job that employers struggle to fill on the terms currently offered. The remedies may be quite different.
Overseas recruitment can support training at home
Imagine a manufacturer that needs an experienced engineer before it can accept a new contract. Alongside that appointment, it proposes two trainee positions.
In this hypothetical example, the engineer’s expertise could make the trainees’ opportunities possible. If the experienced appointment cannot proceed, the business may lose both the contract and the proposed training places.
A different employer might recruit internationally year after year while making little effort to develop anyone internally. Both businesses could describe themselves as facing a skills shortage. Their contribution to domestic opportunity would be different.
That is why we would look for a demonstrable connection between recruitment and development: supervision, training time, progression and a realistic timetable.
Training also takes time. A decision to fund a course today does not produce an experienced professional tomorrow. Transition arrangements should reflect how long it actually takes to build the skills a sector needs.
The policy objective should be a stronger domestic workforce, with overseas recruitment assessed against that wider purpose.
What a stronger workforce policy should deliver
In our view, immigration reform should be evaluated against clear employment outcomes: more people entering suitable work, better retention, improved progression and employers investing in skills.
Where a sector seeks continued access to overseas recruitment, government should ask for evidence about the shortage and a realistic account of how domestic capacity will improve. Restrictions should be considered alongside training availability, pay and the time needed for people to become competent.
Enforcement matters too. Concerns about fictitious roles, unlawful recruitment charges or exploitation require investigation and action where breaches are established. Adding another form will achieve little if the underlying conduct goes unexamined.
Employers should receive enough clarity to plan recruitment and training together. Individuals should be able to understand which opportunities are opening up, what preparation they need and what support is available.
A reduction in visa numbers may meet an immigration objective. If the stated purpose is better employment prospects for British workers, those prospects must be measured directly.
What this means for employers considering sponsorship
For employers, the practical starting point is the role, the available workforce and the reason recruitment has become difficult.
A business sponsor licence carries responsibilities that sit alongside the wider staffing decision. The duties, occupation code, salary, worker’s circumstances and recruitment evidence need to support the proposed appointment.
The genuine vacancy requirement deserves particular attention. A job title alone cannot explain why a role exists or establish that its duties support sponsorship.
Our position is that Britain should demand a serious plan for domestic opportunity. That means accessible routes into work, worthwhile jobs and employers who develop people. Immigration controls should be designed and assessed for how they contribute to that result.
If your business is considering a sponsored appointment and needs to establish what requires assessment, request a Case Assessment.
