Reform UK’s right to work proposals are ‘divisive soundbites’

Reform UK has announced that if it formed a government in the UK, it would pay members of the public for tip-offs that led to successful prosecutions of high-street shops employing illegal workers. Here, immigration law specialist Vanessa Ganguin explains why she thinks the proposals are unworkable and discriminatory.

The proposals set out by Reform UK home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf are divisive soundbites aimed at playing on people’s prejudices rather than being policies that would have any merit. Why call the hotline the public is invited to call a “Turkish barbers tip line” unless you are trying to incite hate and prejudice?

Is Reform UK genuinely suggesting people want to live under the sort of informing and finger-pointing that made life in East Germany under the Stasi utterly paranoid and miserable?

If people are incentivised to “inform” on people who may be working illegally, what’s to stop unscrupulous people from “informing” on anybody from any ethnic background they want to indulge their xenophobia on?

The Home Office’s UK Visas and Immigration already takes an intelligence-based approach and acts on tips from the public.

With eVisas digitalising right-to-work checks for many workers, UK employers have no excuse not to conduct proper right-to-work checks.

These give you a statutory excuse to protect from massive fines – which should be enough of an incentive already. Where a business unlawfully employs a worker, they may be subject to a civil penalty of up to £60,000 per worker, and licensed sponsors may lose their licence to sponsor immigrant workers – which can be crippling. Knowingly breaching illegal working rules can already result in prison sentences both for an employer and their worker.

Employers already have to contend with a massive expansion of right-to-work responsibilities under the Labour government to make companies liable for the right to work of subcontractors and those working for them through online matching services. This will come into force from 1 October 2026. This measure has, in part, been brought in to reflect the gig economy and modern ways in which people work.

The big names like Deliveroo have already got on board ahead of the changes this autumn, so Reform UK calling their announcement a “Deliveroo Law” is rather unfair and, no pun intended, but I’m afraid they have missed the boat.

The autumn expansion of right to work responsibilities means further outsourcing of the UK’s immigration checks. What Reform UK is proposing is ridiculous and unnecessary and would only embolden anyone with a prejudice to indulge it, as members of the public are not privy to the right-to-work checks that HR departments have carried out. All they would presumably have to go on is somebody looking different to them or having an accent.

Announcing this at a time when police have had to rescue people from attacks in Thetford, Norfolk after violent protesters tried to storm houses on the simple suspicion that there might be asylum seekers inside and people from minority ethnic communities are feeling fearful after riots in Belfast, is incredibly irresponsible.

Reform UK is wrong to suggest the UK is a “soft touch” when the World Bank estimates our illegal economy is much smaller than comparable European countries, as you would imagine, considering Great Britain is an island.