Robert Jenrick has unveiled plans to scrap Rachel Reeves’s National Insurance rise for British workers, promising a dramatic overhaul of the tax system designed to make it cheaper for firms to hire Britons and more expensive to recruit overseas labour.
In a major intervention on immigration and economic policy, Reform UK’s Treasury spokesman pledged to put “Britons first, migrants second” by cutting employers’ National Insurance contributions for British employees while imposing new costs on businesses that hire foreign workers.
The proposals represent one of the most far-reaching attempts yet by Reform to link immigration policy directly to the tax system, with Mr Jenrick arguing that successive governments have created incentives for businesses to recruit from abroad rather than invest in the domestic workforce.
Speaking on Monday, he said Britain needed to end what he described as a dependence on imported labour and instead reward employers who hire and train British workers.
Under the plans, employers would pay lower National Insurance contributions for British employees, effectively reversing Rachel Reeves’s controversial increase for domestic workers.
However, firms employing overseas workers would continue paying the existing rate while also facing an additional charge through a new “employers’ migrant labour levy”.
The levy would significantly increase the overall cost of hiring workers from overseas, creating a financial incentive for businesses to recruit from within Britain.
Mr Jenrick argued that the existing system had distorted the labour market by allowing employers to rely on a steady flow of foreign workers rather than raising wages, improving productivity or investing in training.
Supporters of the proposal claim it would help tackle stubbornly high levels of migration while boosting employment opportunities for British citizens.
The announcement comes as immigration remains one of the most potent issues in British politics, with Reform seeking to capitalise on voter frustration over record levels of net migration despite repeated promises from successive governments to bring the numbers down.
Party strategists believe concerns over immigration increasingly overlap with anxieties about wages, housing pressures and access to public services, creating fertile political ground for policies that explicitly prioritise British workers.
The proposal also places further pressure on Labour, which has faced sustained criticism from Reform and the Conservatives over migration levels and labour market policy.
Critics, however, are likely to question whether such a system could be implemented without creating significant administrative complexity for employers or raising concerns about discrimination in recruitment practices.
Business groups may also warn that sectors heavily reliant on overseas labour, including social care, hospitality and agriculture, could face substantial increases in employment costs.
Nevertheless, Reform believes the policy strikes at the heart of what many voters see as a fundamental unfairness in the economy.
Party figures argue that British taxpayers should not subsidise a system that allows employers to bypass domestic workers while relying on migration to fill vacancies.
The announcement is also the clearest indication yet of how Reform intends to fuse its economic and immigration agendas ahead of the next general election.
Rather than treating migration solely as a border issue, Mr Jenrick is seeking to frame it as an economic choice made every day by employers.
His message was blunt: businesses should be rewarded for hiring British workers and penalised when they look elsewhere.
As competition intensifies on the Right of British politics, the proposal is likely to ignite fierce debate over how far government should go in reshaping the labour market to favour domestic workers.
For Reform, however, the political calculation is straightforward.
If immigration is driven by demand for labour, then reducing that demand may prove just as important as tightening the border itself.
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