The Care Worker Visa Is Closed: Answering the Workforce Question in Care Tenders

Overseas care worker recruitment has effectively closed, and since 22 July 2025 the Health and Care Worker visa route has been shut to new applicants applying from outside the UK. That single change rewrites how you must answer the workforce question in every care tender you enter. A bid that leans on international recruitment to fill its rota no longer reads as a strength to an evaluator, it reads as a risk.

At a glance

• 22 July 2025: the Health and Care Worker visa route closed to new overseas, out-of-country applicants for care workers, Standard Occupational Classification code 6135, and senior care workers, code 6136.
• Workers already lawfully in the UK can still switch into or extend care sponsorship in-country until 22 July 2028. This is a closure of overseas care worker recruitment, not a ban on every care worker visa.
• The closure was announced in the Immigration White Paper "Restoring Control over the Immigration System", published 12 May 2025.
• Since 11 March 2024, newly sponsored care workers cannot bring dependants, and in England a provider must be CQC-registered to hold a sponsor licence for care workers.
• From 9 April 2025, providers in England must try to recruit from the domestic pool first before sponsoring from overseas.
• Skills for Care reports a vacancy rate of 6.2% for 2025/26, about 96,000 vacancies a day, the lowest since 2015/16.
• International recruitment fell to about 30,000 new starters from abroad, down from about 50,000 the year before and about 105,000 in 2023/24.

What has actually changed: the care worker visa closed to overseas applicants

The care worker visa closed to overseas applicants on 22 July 2025. From that date, the Health and Care Worker visa route stopped accepting new out-of-country applications for care workers, held under Standard Occupational Classification code 6135, and senior care workers, held under code 6136. If your recruitment model assumed a pipeline of candidates sponsored from abroad, that pipeline has gone.

Be precise about what continues, because evaluators are. This is a closure of overseas recruitment, not a ban on every care worker visa. Workers already lawfully in the UK can still switch into care sponsorship, or extend an existing visa, in-country during a transition period that runs until 22 July 2028. That distinction matters when you describe your current sponsored staff in a bid, because they remain a lawful and legitimate part of your workforce.

The closure did not arrive without warning. Since 11 March 2024, newly sponsored care workers have been unable to bring dependants, and in England a provider must be CQC-registered to hold a sponsor licence for care workers at all. From 9 April 2025, providers in England have been required to try to recruit from the domestic pool first, including care workers displaced when a sponsor lost its licence, through regional partnerships, before sponsoring anyone from overseas.

The route closure itself was set out in the Immigration White Paper "Restoring Control over the Immigration System", published on 12 May 2025, which also raised the Skilled Worker baseline to graduate level, RQF Level 6. That same White Paper proposed lengthening the qualifying period for settlement, indefinite leave to remain, from 5 to 10 years, with a possibility of a longer baseline for lower-paid roles. That settlement change is a proposal, not law, and its timing is unconfirmed, so treat it as direction of travel rather than a fixed rule when you plan your workforce.

What the care worker workforce numbers now say

The headline figure looks like good news and is widely misread. Skills for Care reports a vacancy rate of 6.2% for 2025/26, around 96,000 vacancies a day, the lowest since 2015/16. Read carelessly, that suggests the care staff shortage is easing. Read properly, it shows a sector that filled its gaps with a wave of overseas recruitment that has now been switched off.

International recruitment has collapsed. Skills for Care data shows new starters arriving from abroad fell to about 30,000, down from about 50,000 the year before and about 105,000 in 2023/24. At the same time, the domestic workforce is shrinking underneath it. British nationals filled about 40,000 fewer posts across the year and are down about 130,000 since 2020/21. The sector holds roughly 1.59 million filled posts, but the mechanism that recently backfilled it is closing.

Retention is where the real pressure sits. From the 2025 edition of the Skills for Care data, covering 2024/25, staff turnover ran at 23.1% overall and about 28.5% for care workers. Median care worker pay was £12.00 an hour in March 2025, only about 56p above the National Living Wage. This is a low-margin, high-turnover workforce in a sector that Skills for Care values at about £77.8 billion in GVA to the England economy, and the pool you now recruit from is domestic and finite.

Why the care tender workforce question is scored harder now

Commissioners know all of this. The workforce question in a care tender was always about deliverability, but for years an evaluator could accept "we will recruit to meet demand" because recruitment was, in practice, achievable through overseas sponsorship. That assumption has gone, and evaluators have adjusted what they probe.

The care tender workforce question is now a sustainability test. When you promise to staff a new contract, the evaluator is asking where those people will actually come from, given that the overseas route is closed and the domestic pool is contested. A method statement that cannot answer that convincingly exposes the whole bid, because an under-staffed contract means missed visits, safeguarding risk and handbacks, and commissioners have been burned by exactly that.

We see the shift in scoring narratives across councils. Workforce answers that once passed on intention now lose marks unless they show a credible, mostly domestic supply and, above all, the ability to keep the people you already have. The balance of evidence has moved from how you will recruit to whether you can retain.

How to write a recruitment method statement that scores

Lead with domestic recruitment, because that is what the policy now requires and what the evaluator now expects. Set out your local recruitment channels, your conversion rates, your time-to-hire and how you reach candidates in the specific area the contract covers. Show that you understand the 9 April 2025 domestic-pool-first duty and that your model already runs that way.

Name the displaced-worker pool explicitly. Workers whose sponsor lost its licence have been left onshore, and regional partnerships exist to redeploy them. A provider that describes how it recruits from this pool, lawfully and ethically, demonstrates both compliance and a live source of trained, UK-based staff. That is a concrete mechanism, not a slogan.

Then evidence the pipeline you build rather than buy. Grow-your-own routes, apprenticeships, values-based recruitment and a working Care Certificate induction all tell an evaluator you can generate your own workforce. Where you use agency staff, quantify it and show a plan to reduce it, because heavy agency reliance now reads as instability. A strong recruitment and retention method statement ties each of these claims to numbers you can defend.

How to write a retention method statement that scores

Retention is now your strongest workforce evidence, so lead your recruitment and retention method statement with it wherever the question allows. If you can show turnover below the sector benchmark, say so and give the figure, because against Skills for Care's 23.1% overall and roughly 28.5% for care workers, a lower number is immediate, credible proof that your staffing promise will hold.

Evidence the drivers, not just the outcome. Pay above the statutory floor, and above the £12.00 median where you can reach it, is worth stating plainly. Career pathways from care worker to senior to deputy, structured supervision and appraisal, and genuine wellbeing support are the mechanisms that produce a retention figure, and evaluators want to see the mechanism as well as the result.

Tie retention back to the contract. Stable teams mean continuity of care, fewer safeguarding incidents and consistent CQC-registered oversight, which is precisely what the outcomes in the specification are asking for. When you connect a low turnover rate to the commissioner's own outcome measures, you convert an HR statistic into a scored advantage.

Sponsorship, compliance and ethical recruitment

If you sponsor workers, your compliance record is now part of your workforce credibility. In England you must be CQC-registered to hold a sponsor licence for care workers, and a clean sponsor-licence compliance history signals to an evaluator that your existing sponsored staff are secure and lawfully employed. A shaky sponsorship record does the opposite.

Where you have taken on onshore workers whose previous sponsor failed, describe it. Supporting displaced workers into stable employment is exactly the behaviour the domestic-pool-first policy was designed to encourage, and it evidences ethical recruitment in practice rather than in policy language.

Treat modern slavery and ethical recruitment as scored assurance, not boilerplate. Set out how you recruit without exploitative fees, how you check right to work, and how your supply chain meets the Modern Slavery Act. In a market reshaped by the overseas care worker recruitment clampdown, this section has moved from compliance footnote to evidence that your workforce is sourced responsibly.

What to stop saying in your bid

Stop saying you recruit internationally to fill gaps. As a forward-looking staffing plan for care workers, that promise is now largely undeliverable, and an evaluator who knows the route closed on 22 July 2025 will mark it as a risk rather than a reassurance.

Reframe your existing international staff instead. They are not a recruitment pipeline, they are a stable, settled, supported part of your team, many able to switch or extend in-country until at least 22 July 2028. Describe how you retain and develop them alongside your domestic workforce.

Cut anything that assumes the old world. Remove language that treats overseas sponsorship as your growth mechanism, and replace it with the domestic recruitment, retention and grow-your-own evidence that scores today. The workforce question has changed, and your answer has to change with it.

FAQ

Is the care worker visa still available in 2026?

Not for new overseas applicants. The Health and Care Worker visa route closed to out-of-country care worker applications on 22 July 2025 and remains closed. Workers already in the UK can still switch into or extend care sponsorship in-country during a transition period running to 22 July 2028, so this is a closure of overseas care worker recruitment rather than a total ban on care worker visas.

Can care providers still sponsor overseas workers?

Not from overseas for the care worker and senior care worker roles. You cannot bring a new care worker into the UK on this route. You can still sponsor eligible workers who are already lawfully in the UK to switch or extend in-country until 22 July 2028, and in England you must be CQC-registered to hold a sponsor licence at all.

How do you answer the workforce question in a care tender now?

Lead with domestic recruitment and retention, not international sourcing. Evidence your local recruitment channels, your use of the displaced-worker pool, your grow-your-own and apprenticeship routes, and above all a turnover rate that beats the sector benchmark. Connect each claim to a figure and to the commissioner's own outcomes so the evaluator can see the workforce promise is deliverable.

What is the care worker visa transition period?

It is the window, running to 22 July 2028, during which care workers already in the UK can still switch into or extend sponsorship in-country even though the overseas route has closed. It protects your existing sponsored staff, and you should describe them in bids as a settled part of your workforce rather than as a recruitment channel.

What does the domestic-pool-first rule mean for my bid?

Since 9 April 2025, providers in England must try to recruit from the domestic pool, including workers displaced when a sponsor lost its licence, before sponsoring from overseas. In a bid, it means an evaluator expects to see that your recruitment model already prioritises UK-based candidates and engages with regional redeployment partnerships.

The overseas recruitment clampdown has not only changed who staffs the sector, it has changed what a winning workforce answer looks like, and the providers who rebuild their recruitment and retention method statements around domestic supply and proven retention are the ones whose bids will still read as safe.