Overseas Society members included in visa extension

"We need to be doing more to attract overseas professionals"

Published: 30 April 2020 Government & NHS

After concerted lobbying by the Society and the other AHP health trade unions, the Home Office has confirmed the one year visa extension will cover all AHPs

The programme to renew visas due to expire before 1 October 2020 had previously only applied to NHS doctors, nurses and paramedics.

Dean Rogers, the SoR director of industrial strategy and member relations says, “Without this victory, members who needed to extend their visa to continue working and living in the UK felt hugely threatened.

"We’ve seen with PPE that politicians are reluctant to admit mistakes so it took longer than it should have but we are delighted to have secured this change."

Following the combined effort from the Society as a professional body and trade union, the visa extension will be free-of-charge to SoR members and other AHPs.

Dean continued, "As well as offering immediate reassurance to the members impacted, we also hope that this break with the Home Office’s 'hostile environment' approach will be another signal of a more sensible, fairer way forward.

"We need to be doing more to attract overseas professionals and there are still too many wrong signals and barriers from government, such as the ludicrous tax on NHS staff from overseas that they have to pay to access health services.

"We’ll continue to challenge these barriers, strengthened by the latest success on free visa extensions.”