Nigel Farage has told Sky News he would allow some essential migration in areas with skill shortages but that numbers would be capped.

The Reform UK leader said he would announce the cap “in four years’ time” after he was pressed repeatedly by Sky’s deputy political editor Sam Coates about his manifesto pledge to freeze “non-essential” immigration.

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It was put to Mr Farage that despite his criticism of the government’s migration crackdown, allowing essential migration in his own plans is quite a big caveat given the UK’s skills shortages.

However the Clacton MP said he would allow people to plug the gaps on “time dependent work permits” rather than on longer-term visas.

He said: “Let’s take engineering, for argument’s sake. We don’t train enough engineers, we just don’t. It’s crazy.

“We’ve been pushing young people to doing social sciences degrees or whatever it is.

“So you’re an engineering company, you need somebody to come in on skills. If they come in, on a time dependent work permit, if all the right health assurances and levies have been paid and if at the end of that period of time, you leave or you’re forced to leave, then it works.”

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Reform’s manifesto, which they call a “contract”, says that “essential skills, mainly around healthcare, must be the only exception” to migration.

Pressed on how wide his exemption would be, Mr Farage said he hopes enough nurses and doctors will be trained “not to need anybody from overseas within the space of a few years”.

He said that work permits should be separate to immigration, adding: “If you get a job for an American TV station and you stay 48 hours longer than your work permit, they will smash your front door down, put you in handcuffs and deport you.

“We allow all of these routes, whether it’s coming into work, whether it’s coming as a student, we have allowed all of these to become routes for long-term migration.”

Asked if he would put a cap on his essential skills exemption, he said: “We will. I can’t tell you the numbers right now, I don’t have all the figures. What I can tell you is anyone that comes in will not be allowed to stay long-term. That’s the difference.”

Pressed if that was a commitment to a cap under a Reform UK government, he suggested he would set out further detail ahead of the next election, telling Coates: “Ask me in four years’ time, all right?”

Mr Farage was speaking after the government published an immigration white paper which pledged to ban overseas care workers as part of a package of measures to bring down net migration.

The former Brexit Party leader claimed the proposals were a “knee jerk reaction” to his party’s success at the local elections and accused the prime minister of not having the vigour to “follow them through”.

However he said he supports the “principle” of banning foreign care workers and conceded he might back some of the measures if they are put to a vote in parliament.

He said: “If it was stuff that did actually bind the government, there might be amendments on this that you would support. But I’m not convinced.”