The Home Office has a “limited understanding” of the social care system and it “should have been obvious” that lots of migrants would arrive for jobs in care, the former borders watchdog has said.
David Neal says the immigration system has invited large numbers of low-skilled care workers into the UK.
His findings are in a report published after he was sacked.
The Home Office said it had already taken steps to limit overseas carers.
The former chief inspector of borders and immigration said government policy to allow thousands more migrant care workers into the UK after the pandemic produced “shocking results”.
His report found one care home that did not exist and had sponsored 275 migrant visas, and a further 1,234 certificates granted to a company with only four employees when given a licence.
“My inspectors encountered migrants with care visas working illegally in two out of eight enforcement visits they observed during my inspection of illegal working enforcement,” said Mr Neal’s report.
He said the government under-estimated the demand for the care worker visa.
“There are echoes of previous inspections that have highlighted the consequences of the Home Office’s failure to accurately forecast, such as small boat arrivals,” he added.
The government has already put restrictions on care workers who want to bring their families to the UK.
Private jet passengers
A spokesman for the Home Office said: “We have already intervened to stop the flow of overseas care workers entering the UK where there is no genuine role for them to undertake and taken robust action against businesses committing labour exploitation.
“We do not tolerate illegal activity in the labour market and we will continue to revoke licenses from those who abuse the system.
“New measures already in force will cut the rising numbers of visas granted and address significant concerns about high levels of non-compliance, worker exploitation and abuse.”
Another of Mr Neal’s reports published today criticised the inspection of private jet passengers by Border Force officials at London City airport.
He said there was a “significant risk” to the border because large numbers of arrivals were going uninspected.
The Home Office has insisted that his report used inaccurate data that he did not take the opportunity to correct.
‘Scandalous’
The director-general of Border Force, Phil Douglas, said security checks were carried out on all arrivals of private jets, known as “general aviation” by officials.
“We will never compromise on border security and carry out robust security checks on those arriving into the UK, including both scheduled and notified general aviation flights,” he added.
Mr Neal was sacked in February after he gave data from the report about private jets to the Daily Mail newspaper.
The same data was redacted in today’s report when it was issued to parliament, and the Home Office says it will not publish the figures on grounds of national security.
Labour’s shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper called his findings “scandalous”.
“From allowing high security risk flights to swan into the country with zero in-person checks, despite risks from drugs, guns and people smuggling, through to rampant labour exploitation in the social care visa,” she said.
“Even now ministers are hiding the true scale of the flaws, redacting much of the vital information, and slipping the reports out when Parliament can’t respond.”