British PM says tough but fair approach to immigration
Janaka Alahapperuma from London
We set up the expert Migration Advisory Committee to advise on the
effects of the Points Based System on the labour market, and while their
latest report suggests that there remain skills we need to recruit from
abroad, it confirms that we no longer need to recruit civil engineers,
hospital consultants, aircraft engineers, ships officers - and so these
and other jobs are being taken off the list.
And the report shows that we are able to target the list on narrower,
more specific vacancies including certain types of scientist,
geologists, critical care nurses, highly specialist trade workers. But
as growth returns I want to see rising levels of skills, wages and
employment among those resident here, rather than employers having to
resort to recruiting people from abroad.
So, I have talked with the chairman of the Migration Advisory
Committee, Professor David Metcalf, about how government and the skills
agencies and the sectors can respond faster in training the existing
labour force for the new skills we need. To date this year we have been
taking a further 30,000 posts off the list and over the coming months we
will remove more occupations and thousands more posts from the list of
those eligible for entry under the Points Based System. So we are
building on the skills strategy which set out the new more tailored
program yesterday to invest in reducing these skills gaps by training up
workers here.
And I have asked the UK Commission for Employment and Skills to
provide advice in January about national priorities for the skills
system. I have asked the Commission to work with the Migration Advisory
Committee to consider removing certain occupations on the shortage list
- for example, engineering roles, skilled chefs, care workers - and to
link that to the priorities of our future investment in the skills of
the future. As part of this review I have asked the two expert bodies to
consult employers, training providers and other agencies to develop
realistic timescales during 2010 for when these occupations will be
taken off the list.
As the economy recovers, we need to do more to ensure that people
with low skills and poor job prospects are helped into work and to
secure decent living standards for them and their families. More
investment in skills, more help for families with childcare, tougher
welfare reform - all will ensure that British people can meet the
responsibility to take up work whenever they can but in return ensure
their right to be properly rewarded for doing so.
Now our second priority is to understand and manage the impact of
immigration at local as well as national level. Whenever there are
short-term increases in the numbers of children at your local school, or
patients using local GP services, extra resources should of course be
provided.
The new Migration Impact Fund, launched earlier this year, requires
every non-EU migrant who comes to Britain to pay - on top of the visa -
an additional charge into the œ70m fund. And this fund is already paying
out to provide more teaching assistants and to increase GP cover in the
areas most affected by immigration. And I believe it is entirely fair
that newcomers themselves should be asked to make an additional
contribution, over and above tax, to help the communities that they are
joining.
There are concerns in some areas about how social housing is
allocated. And I want to emphasise the importance of local councils,
following the new guidance we have just issued asking and encouraging
them to give more priority to local people and those who have spent a
long time on the waiting list - and to engage more closely with their
communities in setting allocation policies.
Now this comes on top of a pledge to create more housing
opportunities all round - a œ1.5 billion investment in housing which
shows we are committed to investing through the downturn to continue to
build the new housing our communities need, helping to deliver over
100,000 new affordable and, in this case, energy-efficient homes for
young families to rent or buy over the next two years.
And then third, we must set out clearer expectations of newcomers who
plan to stay in our country for any length of time. It is because we
believe those who look to build a new life in Britain should earn the
right to do so that we will now push forward the Points Based System to
the next stage by introducing a points based test not just for entry,
but also for permanent residence and citizenship. And this will enable
us to control the numbers of people staying here permanently just as we
are controlling the numbers coming in.
So the right to stay permanently will no longer follow automatically
after living here for a certain number of years. Instead, as we have
said, that after living here for five years, migrants will have to apply
to become probationary citizens - and at that point they will pass a
points-based test, with evidence of continuing economic contribution, of
skills, of progress in English and knowledge of life in Britain.
And of course everyone must show a clean criminal record. The most
basic but also must fundamental principle is that anybody who comes here
- whether to work, to study, or to live - should obey our laws and pay
the price if they don’t. Now, our position since August 2008 is that
those coming from outside the EU who commit any crime resulting in a
sentence of over one year will be considered for deportation. But since
April this year our position is that those from inside the EU who are
convicted of sex, drug or violent offences resulting in a sentence of 12
months or more will be considered for deportation.
And we are deporting an increasing proportion of foreign criminals.
For when a mother or father is grieving for a son who has been killed,
or caring for a daughter who has been assaulted, it cannot possibly be
right for that grief to be compounded by the knowledge that the
perpetrator had no right to be here in the first place. In total we
remove 68,000 people from the UK each year, double the level in 1997 -
and this includes more than 500 European nationals who have committed
crimes.
To be continued
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