Migrant women's access to citizenship rights in host countries is frequently circumscribed by the legal frameworks that shape their deployment in domestic labour markets. The distinction between "skilled" and "unskilled" work is inscribed in labour and immigration regimes that, in turn, determine a migrant's working conditions (including wages, hours of work, days off, and so on) as well as her freedom of mobility, ability to marry and sponsor family members, and eligibility for permanent residency and ultimately formal citizenship. In the case of Singapore, the state tries to achieve its goal of enhancing the skills base of its labour force through an immigration regime that classifies non-citizen workers by their salaries. The state uses a three-tier system to admit non-citizen workers in which migrants are classified as: professionals (employment pass holders), mid-level skilled workers (S pass holders), and unskilled workers (work permit holders). These three tiers reflect a gendered division of labour in the migrant labour market, which has implications for the experiences of women migrants in Singapore. Drawing on fieldwork among Filipino migrants working in Singapore, this article explores the ways in which Singapore's skill-based labour migration program impacts on the labour and social rights of migrant nurses. Our analysis explores the ways in which nursing as a profession has come to be positioned within labour, immigration, and education regimes. We argue that Singapore's tiered labour importation program intersects with commonly held public attitudes that position all Filipinos as "maids" with the result that migrant nurses have come to occupy an ambiguous status between the categories of skilled/unskilled worker. While migrant nurses' liminality structures their migration experience, it is also a site of resistance.

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