MAC’s 5 recommendations to transform the Seasonal Worker visa scheme

On 16 July 2024, the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) published a review of the UK’s Seasonal Worker visa scheme, putting forward five recommendations to transform the route and provide greater security for migrant workers and the agricultural sector.

The Seasonal Worker Visa (Temporary Work) allows workers to come to the UK to work in horticulture (both ornamental and edible) or poultry processing. The government sets a quota for the number of visas to be allocated through the Seasonal Worker scheme, divided between a number of ‘scheme operators’.

For 2024, 47,000 visas were available (45,000 for horticulture and 2,000 for poultry, with an additional 10,000 available as a contingency if needed). Horticulture workers can come to the UK for a maximum of 6 months in any 12-month period, and poultry workers can come for the period between 2 October and 31 December inclusive. The route does not allow settlement, switching or dependants.

The current Seasonal Worker route began life as a pilot scheme in 2019. In May 2024, the government announced that the scheme would be extended for five years to 2029, with the intention of tapering visa numbers down over time.

The MAC, along with employers in the agricultural sector, argue that the Seasonal Worker scheme is essential to maintain food security for the UK and should remain in place. However, the committee has urged the government to do more to tackle worker exploitation and provide greater certainty to employers on the future of the route.

MAC’s 5 recommendations

The five recommendations put forward by the MAC are as follows:

• Provide certainty around the future of the scheme: The MAC says that the government must provide further certainty regarding the long-term future of the scheme, by confirming visa numbers and any further extension to the scheme each year on a rolling basis. This would effectively give employers 5 years’ notice if the scheme is to close.
• Allow for a more flexible visa: Greater flexibility would enable employers to plan more efficiently and for workers to maximise their earnings without adding complexity to the route. To achieve this, the MAC recommends shortening the current ‘cooling-off’ period from the current 6 months to 3 months, and allowing workers to work any 6-month period in an individual calendar year. These measures would allow Seasonal Workers to return to the UK more quickly to meet employer demand.
• Fairer work and pay for workers: The MAC is concerned that wages for Seasonal Workers are lower than UK-wide averages at the occupation and industry level, but cites a lack of pay data. To offer additional protection for workers, the MAC recommends Seasonal Workers should be guaranteed at least 2 months’ pay to cover their costs in coming to the UK, with exemptions for extenuating circumstances (such as dismissal for poor performance). The process of refunding income tax and opting-out of pension scheme auto-enrolment should also be made clearer and easier.
• Tighten, communicate and enforce employee rights: Seasonal Workers are particularly vulnerable to exploitation whilst working in the UK due to the nature of the work in often isolated rural areas, frequently with little or no English. To improve safeguarding, the MAC recommends a more coordinated approach between the bodies currently involved in worker welfare and a clearer delineation of responsibility for each. Worker rights must also be clearly communicated to workers in their own language.
• Give consideration to the Employer Pays Principle: Seasonal Workers currently bear considerable costs to come to the UK, including visa fees and travel fares. This increases the risk of ‘debt bondage’ and exploitation. The committee suggests that further work is needed to investigate how these costs might be more equitably shared along the supply chain.

Next steps

Ultimately, the MAC review found that there is still a clear need for the UK to maintain a Seasonal Worker scheme to maintain current levels of food production in the short-to-medium term. This will provide certainty to businesses who operate in a sector unusually reliant on migrant labour, given the lack of domestic workers and the seasonal and rural nature of the work.

The committee therefore welcomed the previous Conservative government’s decision to extend the scheme to 2029. But with a new government now in place, the MAC stresses the importance of ensuring that there are appropriate policies in place to safeguard domestic food production and reduce the sector’s reliance on migrant labour long-term.

We now expect the newly elected Labour government to consider the MAC’s findings and decide which recommendations they will take forward.

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