Updated Code of Practice now published including red list update
The updated Code of Practice for the International Recruitment of Health and Social Care Personnel has now been published.
To note that the main update is to the Code for Practice red list to add the following countries: Comoros, Laos, Rwanda, Samoa, Timor-Leste, Tuvalu, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. This aligns the Code red list with the recently updated WHO Health Workforce Support and Safeguards List 2023.
The following Q&A explains the change in a bit more detail.
What is the red list of countries?
The Code of Practice red list contains those countries identified by the WHO as having significant health workforce challenges. The Code prohibits active international recruitment from these countries. Active recruitment is where job opportunities are actively promoted or candidates are actively targeted.
What's changed?
Comoros, Laos, Rwanda, Samoa , Timor-Leste, Tuvalu, Zambia, and Zimbabwe have been added the Code of Practice red list.
This means all active international recruitment from these countries will need to stop with immediate effect.
Will all recruitment from these countries need to stop?
The Code prohibits active international recruitment. However, the Code is mindful of a person’s right to migrate and therefore individual health or care workers from countries on the red list are permitted to make direct applications to health and social care UK jobs. This means they do it independently, without being proactively targeted by an employer or recruitment agency.
What happens if recruiters have already started to recruit a doctor or nurse from these countries?
Where conditional UK employment contracts have been awarded on, or prior to, Thursday 23 March 2023, the recruitment processes may continue. This provision recognises the investment which has already been made to get the candidate to this stage of the recruitment process, and is a fair way to treat candidates who are fully expecting to be able to move to the UK to work.
Have there been other updates to the Code?
Other minor updates to the Code of Practice include:
Making it a condition of the benchmark on information provision that the guidance on applying for a health or social care job in the UK from abroad is provided to international candidates at the earliest opportunity
Clarifying that the appointment of healthcare professionals onto postgraduate training programmes is outside the scope of the Code.
Making it mandatory for organisations on the Ethical Recruiters List to respond to the NHS Employers biannual survey on recruitment activity.
Updates to improve and streamline the process for Code contraveners