Recommendation 2

The Home Office has not had a full understanding of how immigration has helped to address skill shortages or the unintended consequences of the much higher than anticipated use of the Skilled Worker route. More people have used the Skilled Worker visa route than the Home Office anticipated in 2020. It forecast that it would issue 360,000 Skilled Worker visas to overseas applicants (including dependants) over the three years to April 2024, but it issued 931,000. From when the government opened the Skilled Worker visa route in December 2020 up to the end of 2024, 1.18 million people applied to enter the United Kingdom via this route, including, 630,000 as dependants of the main applicant. The route has brought benefits and enabled employers to recruit internationally to help address skill shortages. However, there have also been consequences, such as an 80% increase in people staying permanently in the United Kingdom in 2024 compared to 2021, and the number of people claiming asylum after entering on a Skilled Worker visa rising from 53 in 2022 to 5,300 in 2024. The Home Office reviewed the use of the route in 2022—before its expansion to include care workers—and the recent White Paper sets out the occupations making use of Skilled Worker visas. However, the Home Office has not yet published its evaluation of the route, including whether it is meeting its objectives, the impact on skills shortages across different sectors of the labour market or regions of the United Kingdom, and whether the route has operated as intended. recommendation Alongside its Treasury minute response to this report, the Home Office should write to the Committee setting out the results of its evaluation of the Skilled Worker visa route, including: • the costs and benefits of the route; • the extent to which the route is helping employers across sectors/regions to address skill shortages; and • any unintended consequences of the higher than expected use of the route including the impact of the