Scrap the cap: pressure mounts to allow more foreign doctors into UK

The cap on numbers of health professionals from outside the European Economic Area being allowed to enter the UK to work is coming under increasing pressure.

By Thursday 3 May 12 royal colleges, the BMA, and NHS Employers, which represents organisations that employ NHS staff, had called on the new home secretary, Sajid Javid, to allow more doctors the chance to secure one of the 20 700 tier 2 (general) certificates of sponsorship awarded each year to people recruited from outside the EEA.1

The Labour Party went further and said that all NHS workers should be exempted from the tier 2 visa system and an alternative system be put in place for these groups. And the GMC has called on the government to tackle delays in issuing visas.

All these organisations agree …