19/03/2025
Letters sent by the Home Office, seen by Nursing Times, have asked nurses to leave the UK as soon as next week, after their visas were revoked following fraud allegations by the nursing regulator.
“The NMC could be accused of deliberate delay”
Peters Omoragbon
The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) has been accused of “deliberately delaying” hearings and has been urged to immediately remedy the situation so that nurses are not repatriated before their appeal has been heard.
The NMC has refuted claims that the delays are deliberate and said it was working to schedule the remaining hearings as soon as possible.
It comes as almost 2,000 internationally educated Nigerian nurses were impacted by the NMC’s investigation into fraud concerns at a testing site in Ibadan, Nigeria run by Pearson VUE on behalf of the NMC.
Nursing Times reported last year that almost 50 nurses were looking to take the NMC to court, claiming they had unfairly had their registration removed or their application to join the register refused following the fraud investigations.
Some nurses described how they had been prematurely fired by their employers and had their visas revoked while they awaited their hearing outcomes.
Now, several nurses have been issued letters to leave the UK by the Home Office.
Nursing Times can reveal that the same 50 nurses served the NMC with a “pre-action protocol letter” in February, giving the regulator 14 days to respond to their concerns or legal action would be taken.
Among several demands, the NMC was asked to liaise with the Home Office to ensure the nurses threatened with deportation can stay in the UK until their appeals have concluded.
In addition, the letter called for a complete reconsideration of all those who have been removed from the register or had their application refused, after one of the 50 nurses accused of fraudulent entry successfully appealed.
https://www.instagram.com/p/DHYX6mFNpC9/?igsh=d2ljY3J5N3hrbmU3
Nursing Times understands that the NMC failed to respond to the pre-action protocol letter by the deadline, and that the nurses will now be looking to pursue legal action.
Background to the CBT investigation
The NMC launched an investigation in 2023 into the Yunnik Technologies Test Centre in Ibadan, Nigeria after it was alerted to anomalous data coming from the site.
゚viralシ2024fyp