The UK government has announced plans to bring down “low-skilled” migration to the UK post-Brexit. “It is going to bring [European Union] free movement to an end once and for all,” the Prime Minister Theresa May informed the BBC.
There’s an official grading scheme called the Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF). To be eligible for one of the UK’s “skilled” Tier 2 general visas foreigners need at least an RQF level 6 grade. This means the equivalent of an undergraduate degree or a graduate diploma or a degree apprenticeship.
However, the Migration Advisory Committee suggests that the definition of “skilled” should be lowered to RQF level 3. This means the equivalent of A-levels. Yet the current visa system restricts Tier 2 visas to people who will command an annual salary of at least £30,000. And the MAC said this salary minimum should remain. This is above the UK’s median full-time wage of about £28,000.
“This wouldn’t just hit fruit-pickers and baristas but butchers, primary school teachers, radiographers and so on,” says Jonathan Portes of King’s College London.
“The research we commissioned showed that overall there is no evidence that migration has had a negative impact on the training of the UK-born workforce,” MAC said. “Moreover, there is some evidence to suggest that skilled migrants have a positive impact on the quantity of training available to the UK-born workforce.” As for wages, while the MAC found some evidence of a negative impact on the level of low-skill UK wages, the effect was judged to be “generally small”.
“Higher-skilled workers tend to have higher earnings so make a more positive contribution to the public finances. The estimated labour market impacts, though small, also suggest that higher-skilled workers are of greater benefit as do any impacts on productivity and innovation,” it said. Yet, despite its recommendations, the MAC didn’t find that low-skilled immigrations were an economic drain either in terms of national productivity or the public finances.
“It’s true that in an ideal world we might want migrants to be highly skilled and high net-contributors, but that isn’t what all employers need,” says Heather Rolfe of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (Niesr) “Post-Brexit immigration policy cannot ignore the needs of employers in key, low-skilled sectors and workable options need to be put in place.”
Stephen Martin, director general of the Institute of Directors, explained, " Sectors like agriculture, retail, hospitality and construction rely heavily on so-called ‘low-skilled’ workers, in part because domestic workers want to work in other sectors, and in part because unemployment is at a record low. The UK needs a balanced migration policy which takes account of skills at all levels, a single-minded focus on reducing numbers would be cutting off our nose to spite our face.”
Carolyn Fairbairn, director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, said the prime minister’s proposals for a new system “have taken a wrong turn”.
“By dismissing the importance of low-skilled workers to the UK economy, the government risks harming businesses and living standards now and in the future,” she added. “All skill levels matter to the UK economy. Today’s proposals risk worsening labour shortages, already serious in construction, hospitality and care. Restricting access to the workers the UK needs is self-defeating.”
More than 30 per cent of all employees in the food production sector are EU nationals. In domestic personnel the figure is 27 per cent and 16 per cent in warehousing.
The Federation of Master Builders reported that the shortage of construction workers for small- and medium-sized firms had hit the worst level on record. Subsequent research from the Construction Industry Training Board in July revealed about half of construction firms expect recruitment to become more difficult over the next two years. Meanwhile, the British Chambers of Commerce said that, in the second quarter of this year, 71 per cent of manufacturing firms were reporting recruitment issues, with Brexit the “key factor”.
No comments:
Post a Comment