Every day in the UK, migrant workers face the risk of labour exploitation. This is harmful for workers, bad for business, and risks tarnishing the UK’s human rights record. This report examines why this happens, and what needs to change.

The rise in labour exploitation is not coincidental. In our view, it is the outcome of a system which for too long has prioritised the enforcement of immigration controls at all costs, but has left the enforcement of workers’ rights insufficiently supported.

Drawing on over 40 case studies with sponsored workers, interviews with caseworkers, and an analysis of Home Office guidance and annual reports of labour enforcement agencies, we find the following:

The ‘new’ Points Based immigration system (PBS) introduced after Brexit makes most migrants’ right to come to the UK to work contingent upon holding a job offer from an employer licensed by the Home Office. This aspect of the PBS, which we refer to as the ‘work sponsorship system’, severely limits migrant workers’ abilities to change employers, preventing them from reporting labour exploitation, and increasing the risk that they accept precarious work conditions. To illustrate this, we draw on a harrowing case study of four Indian nurses who were scammed into paying over £20,000 each for a Health and Care Worker visa, but who are unable to report the scam for fear that doing so will lead to their visas being curtailed.

The labour enforcement system is also ill-equipped to tackle the problem of migrant worker exploitation. With responsibility divided between several agencies which hold different approaches to investigation, and resourcing that falls far below international standards, the system is currently fragmented and over-reliant on businesses to selfregulate.