Will the recent measures introduced by the UK government will result in...

[Sunder Rana]

...desired UK immigration levels? Will it restrict entry of the people wanting to immigrate to the UK?

 

[maggie]

The recent measures introduced by the UK government are aimed at reducing immigration levels from non EEA countries. They are designed to close the loophole that allowed anyone with a masters or PhD to work in the UK at any job. This meant that Tier 1 visa holders were not under any obligation to take highly skilled work, but could take jobs that could and should have been filled by the resident workforce, while less qualified migrants not only had to have a firm job offer from an employer licenced by UKBA to sponsor non EEA nationals (a lengthy and expensive process for the employer) but also had to prove their superior suitability for the post over every other UK or EEA applicant. To have any unrestricted work visa route in times of recession and high unemployment is nonsense. The whole point of Tier 1 was to attract highly skilled people to the UK whose contribution would be both socially and economically beneficial. Instead, 30 percent of these visa holders were not working in highly skilled medical, science, financial and engineering posts as intended, but were actually in non, low or semi skilled jobs such as taxi drivers or security guards!!

The proposed changes to the student visa will make it harder for non degree students to come to the UK. Although a great number of bogus colleges have been closed down over the past couple of years, there are still too many soft options for study that act as a cover for illegal workers. The success of any changes will be how well the changes manage to prevent bogus students coming to the UK without impacting on the serious economic benefits that international students bring to the country.

Already the numbers of migrants in the work visa categories has fallen as a result of the caps that have been in place since July. With the abolition of Tier 1 visas in April and the suspension of any new applications made outside the UK since 23 December, these figures will fall further over the next few months.