Labour PPS floats billions in NHS recruitment reparations

A Labour government aide has suggested that Britain should spend billions of pounds compensating developing countries whose citizens come to work in the NHS.

Dr Beccy Cooper, a parliamentary private secretary in the Cabinet Office, told a Labour conference fringe event that G20 states should ‘continue’ discussions on an agreement requiring wealthy countries that recruit foreign-trained health workers to invest proportionately in the health systems and workforces of the nations from which they recruit.

Cooper said: ‘We have some incredible support workers, some incredible development people, and we really need to say, hang on a second, we very much benefit from people coming to work in our National Health Service. How do we make sure that those countries that are absolutely supporting our National Health Service are supported in their health systems? And the World Health Assembly passed that motion that said absolutely there should be reciprocity. The G20 can continue that conversation. It can absolutely say it’s a global health workforce. People have the answers, people have the skills, we just need to make sure that they are deployed equitably across the globe.’

According to a March 2026 report by the APPG on Global Health and Security, recruiting workers from overseas has saved the NHS approximately £14 billion in domestic training costs. Under Cooper’s logic, Britain could therefore be left spending billions of pounds in taxpayer cash to compensate countries for the resulting brain drain. Another day, another Labour spending bill proposal for Britain.

Responding to the suggested spending splurge, Conservative Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said: ‘We have already taken huge numbers of overseas health workers, and this route has been abused to drive up immigration when it should have been brought down. Now Labour wants British taxpayers to pay for training doctors and nurses abroad. A Labour Government aide is cheering on a scheme that would send taxpayers’ money overseas for every nurse and doctor the NHS recruits, opening the door even wider and handing the bill to hard-working families. No one in Labour’s Government should be encouraging it.’