Businesses will have to end their reliance on foreign workers and hire unemployed Britons, Mel Stride will say on Tuesday in a pre-election pitch to Tory voters.
The Work and Pensions Secretary will pledge to “put right” decades of overdependence on imported labour as part of plans to slash net migration by 300,000 a year.
He will argue that welfare reforms, including a crackdown on long-term sickness benefits for milder mental health conditions, will make more domestic staff available.
His intervention will be seen as an attempt to draw a clear dividing line with Labour on immigration and benefits while appealing to traditional Conservative voters.
Mr Stride will use a speech in central London to warn firms that the days of bringing in cheap workers from abroad while millions of Britons languish on benefits are over.
But in a carrot-and-stick approach he will also unveil a series of incentives to hire domestic staff, including cash payments for taking on apprentices and extra training.
It will be the third in a series of planned addresses by senior ministers, to be delivered over the coming weeks, which will set out the Tories’ big picture offer to voters.
Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister, and Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, delivered the first two last week which featured blistering attacks on Labour over security and taxes.
Mr Stride will move the attack on to the battle to tame the ballooning welfare budget, championing the Tories’ twin crackdown on immigration and sickness benefits.
He will say: “With the next generation of welfare reforms, we are building a new economic model based on British talent.
“It’s a plan providing more opportunities for people here at home to get on, to progress, and to increase their pay.”
He will go on to say that pubs and restaurants, care homes, construction firms and manufacturers must employ more Britons.
Recruitment challenge
He will point to a border crackdown announced last December by the Prime Minister which is expected to see net migration fall by around 300,000 this year.
The measures included curbing the number of dependents foreign workers can bring and raising the salary threshold for the issuing of employment visas.
“I know this presents a recruitment challenge for some employers in certain sectors, particularly those that have relied more on migration in the past,” Mr Stride will say.
“But this is also a huge opportunity for the thousands of jobseekers within our domestic workforce to move into roles that have previously been filled by overseas workers.
“So my message to businesses is clear – our jobcentre teams stand ready to help you find the right candidate, and we want to work with you to overcome recruitment challenges.
“And my message is also to the British people. For too long, we have relied on labour from abroad when there is great talent right here in the UK – I am determined to put that right.”
Mr Stride is expected to announce that measures introduced in 2021 to tackle the post-pandemic shortage of lorry drivers will be extended to four other sectors.
They included incentive payments of £3,000 to firms who employed an apprentice, and funding of up to £5,000 to pay for specialist training for new staff.
Ministers also provided grants to charities to train up ex-offenders and expanded Jobcentre schemes to encourage more unemployed people into the haulage industry.
Under the new plan, similar measures are now expected to be extended to the hospitality, social care, construction and manufacturing sectors.
It comes as the Tories plan to create a clear dividing line with Sir Keir Starmer by accusing the Labour leader of being soft on welfare and immigration.
Polling shows that while the public overall are evenly split on the issue of migration, Conservative voters strongly favour a tougher approach.
A survey carried out by YouGov last November found that 61 per cent of 2019 Tory voters want to see immigration reduced even if it means lower economic growth.
The same pollster found in December that three quarters (74 per cent) of Conservative voters backed the move to increase the salary threshold for work visas.
Net migration hit a record high of 672,000 last year, with workers from across the globe filling vacancies created by fewer post-Brexit arrivals from the EU.
At the same time, there are more than nine million Britons who are neither in work nor looking for a job following a post-pandemic surge in long-term illness.
Labour has rejected No 10’s approach and says it would tackle worklessness by slashing NHS waiting lists meaning people get the treatment they need.
It has also unveiled plans to devolve control over employment support to local areas and “end the tick box culture” at jobcentres.
Alison McGovern, the shadow work and pensions secretary, said: “The Conservatives have run down our skills and training system and we now have record levels of net migration.
“They should be putting in place proper plans to tackle worker shortages and adopting Labour’s plans to connect the immigration system to skills.”
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