Employer Sanctions: Instrument of Labour Market Regulation, Migration Control, and Worker Protection?

‘A key pull factor for illegal immigration into the EU is the possibility of obtaining work in the EU without the required legal status. Action against illegal immigration and illegal stay should therefore include measures to counter that pull factor.’² This is the opening statement of the EU Employer Sanctions Directive: a clear attack on illegal employment with the aim to control migration. This chapter focusses on these employer sanctions and examines the functioning of sanctions as a policy tool for migration control. We challenge the idea that employer sanctions, as executed in the Netherlands, are a tool for migration