UK Immigration Minister says graduates can stay in UK

Mark Harper, the UK's immigration minister, has told a Committee of the House of Lords that the UK has failed to communicate the 'very good arrangements' allowing international students to stay and work in the UK after completing their studies at UK universities.


International students can stay and work in the UK providing they can find a skilled job which pays at least £20,000 a year.


Mr Harper was speaking to the House of Lords Soft Power and the UK's Influence Committee which was taking questions from figures involved in the UK's 'export education sector'. The Committee was assembled to 'examine the use of soft power in furthering the United Kingdom's global influence and interests'.

 

 

Bureaucracy dissuading Tier 4 visa applicants

Professor Colin Riordan, who is the vice president of Universities UK, told the committee that students were dissuaded from studying in the UK by several factors, including fees, the bureaucracy involved in getting a UK Tier 4 student visa and the cost of those visas.


However, Professor Riordan told the committee that the main factor deterring international students from studying in the UK was the fact that the government had abolished the Tier 1 (Post Study Work) visa which allowed all graduates of UK universities to work in the UK for two years after graduation. They would then be able to transfer to another visa, such as a Tier 2 (General) skilled worker visa if they were working at the end of the two year period.


John Dickie, the strategy and policy director of London First, a body which lobbies on behalf of London businesses, including the capital's universities such as Imperial College and University College London, said that the closure of the Post Study Work visa stream had put the UK at a disadvantage with countries such as Australia which allows international graduates to work after graduation.

 

 

Accountancy firm disrupted by Post Study Work closure

Mr Dickie said that one major accountancy firm had been in the habit of recruiting Indian graduates who had graduated from UK universities and training them in the UK for a couple of years before sending them back to India to work there. This was now impossible, he said, because of the closure of the Post Study Work stream.


He said that there was a conflict between the government's claims to be 'open for business' and keen to attract the brightest and the best while it is also intending to cut immigration to below 100,000 a year. He said that 'the mood music is, at best, confused'.


Mr Harper said that the UK had to try to communicate its messages effectively. He said that there was a 'gap between perceptions and reality' about what various audiences believed about studying and working in the UK.

 

 

Howell – UK businesses believe they have been harmed by visa changes

Lord Howell, the chairman of the committee, asked Mr Harper why it was that so many people believed very strongly that the government's changes to the UK visa regime were seriously damaging British competitiveness.


Mr Harper said that there were two parts of the UK's visa regime. The first dealt with visitor visas for business visitors and tourists. He said that the UK now offered a very good service in these areas with about 90% of applicants having their visas issued within eight days. He said that this was increasingly being recognised internationally.


A member of the Committee asked him why it was that so many people who had given evidence to the committee were saying that the UK's visa regime seemed unable to provide a good service and was discouraging people from coming to the UK.

 

 

Harper – criticisms are not supported by facts

Mr Harper said that 'lots of people say lots of unhelpful things' but then do not have the facts to support those assertions. He said that there had been an increase in the number of students coming to UK universities, with a great deal of growth from China in particular.


He said that the total number of student visas had fallen because UK immigration had closed down 700 further education colleges 'because there had been significant abuse' of the student visa. Mr Harper said that the UK government had done a very good job of communicating the fact that it had closed down the Post Study Work visa but had done less well in explaining the 'very good' arrangements for graduates that replaced the Post Study Work visa.


Mr Harper said 'If you are a graduate, it's actually very straightforward to stay here. If you have a graduate level job paying just over £20,000 a year, then you can stay in the United Kingdom. I don't think we necessarily landed that argument well enough'.

 

 

Message getting through to Indian graduates

He added 'I think that was a particular problem in India' Mr Harper said that, after the closure of the Post Study Work stream, the number of Indian students studying at UK universities fell. But he said that there had recently been a 12% rise in the number of Indian students studying in the UK; He says that this is because the message that graduates can work in the UK has finally got through.


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MPs criticise plan to make landlords police UK immigration

An influential committee of the UK's House of Commons has criticised a proposal in the government's immigration bill which would require landlords to check the immigration status of their tenants.


The Home Affairs Committee says that this is likely to make it more difficult for all foreign nationals to find accommodation in the UK as landlords may prefer not to rent to foreign nationals rather than face a fine for renting to an illegal resident.


In a report, the Committee says 'There are more than 400 legitimate European identity documents alone on which landlords will have to base their decision. There is a possibility that landlords will discriminate against all immigrants regardless of their status rather than take the risk of housing a person without right to remain'.

 

 

Migrants could be driven into illegal accommodation

This might, in turn, have the effect of driving more and more people into illegal accommodation in sub-standard and overcrowded flats and houses.


The report points out that in 2009, the then Attorney General, Baroness Scotland, was prosecuted for employing a cleaner who was in the country illegally. The court accepted that the Baroness had not realised that her employee was in the country illegally but had, nonetheless, fined her £5,000.


'If one of the government's law officers can make such a mistake,' the report says 'it would be very easy for the average citizen to do so,'; Landlords are unlikely to be experts in UK immigration and so will have difficulty in judging whether a prospective client's paperwork is genuine.

 

 

MPs criticise plan for health charges for refugees

The MPs also criticise proposals in the bill to introduce charges for refugees to use the UK's National Health Service which is free to use for UK residents. The report states that the committee is not necessarily opposed to the introduction of fees for those that come to the UK voluntarily, whether as students or workers. However, it states that it would be 'wholly wrong' for vulnerable people who had come to the UK against their own will or to seek asylum to be charged for treatment.


Committee chairman Keith Vaz MP told journalists that, if the government really wanted to 'get tough' on illegal immigration as it claims, it should ensure that tip-offs from members of the public about suspected illegal immigrants should be followed up.


Mr Vaz said this in response to news that UK immigration had failed to follow up reports about suspected illegal immigrants made by members of the public.

 

 

Only 6% of hotline calls investigated

The UK government established a hotline for members of the public to report suspected illegal immigrants but recently released figures show that UK immigration investigated only 6% of those complaints and only 1.5% resulted in anyone being deported.


The committee said that it had been a 'chaotic summer' for UK immigration policy, mentioning in particular the controversial advertising campaign advising illegal immigrants to 'go home or face arrest' which has now been abandoned and the government's decision to abandon plans to introduce 'security bonds' of up to £3,000 for visa applicants from six 'high risk countries'.


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US Republicans want 'economic-based immigration' system

Former Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Paul Ryan has told a conference that the Republicans want to remodel the US immigration system from 'family based immigration to an economic-based immigration'. Mr Ryan told the Wall Street Journal's CEO Council conference that this would require a 'step-by-step approach' and possibly as many as 'seven or eight different pieces of legislation.

President Obama told the same conference that he would support such an approach, so long as it led to the right result, by which he meant comprehensive immigration reform which dealt with the issue of the 11.5m illegal residents thought to be living in the US as well as with ensuring that there are more work visas for US businesses.


The President promised to make comprehensive immigration reform a major priority during his second term in office. However, he has had difficulty in achieving this because Congress is bitterly split along party lines; there is little support for any of his policies from Republicans, particularly from right-wing Republican members of the House of Representatives who were elected with the backing of the radical Tea Party faction.

 

 

Gang of Eight

In March 2013, a bipartisan group of Senators, known as the Gang of Eight, revealed a massive comprehensive reform bill over 1,300 pages long. Its main provisions were

• An increase of $4.5bn in spending on border security
• The establishment of a 'pathway to citizenship' for most illegal immigrants. It would take over thirteen years to complete the pathway and applicants would be required to pay back taxes and learn English before they could become citizens
• Make it much easier for foreign students who receive doctorates and PhDs from US universities to apply for US permanent residence visas (green cards)
• An increase in the number of H-1B 'specialty occupation' temporary work visas granted each year from 85,000 annually to a maximum of about 200,000 annually
• The creation of a new 'w-visa' stream for low-skilled workers in agriculture and construction
• A new requirement for US employers to check the employment status of all prospective employees on the E-Verify system before employing them

The Democrat-controlled Senate passed the bill in June 2013. To become law, it then had to be passed by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, of which Mr Ryan is a member.


Unfortunately for the President, while many Republicans agreed that the US immigration system is 'broken' they disagreed vehemently with many of the proposals in the comprehensive immigration reform bill.

 

 

Pathway equals amnesty

Many Republicans see the 'pathway' as the granting of an 'amnesty' for people who have broken the law by travelling to and residing in the US illegally. They say it would reward criminal behaviour and encourage more people to do the same. They say that there can be no question of the creation of a 'pathway' until the border with Mexico is secure. Many would oppose it even then.


Mr Ryan is one of few Republican members of the House who has spoken out in favour of immigration reform but even he opposes the controversial 'pathway to citizenship'.


He told the Wall Street Journal CEO Council conference 'We want to make sure we create a system that does not grant amnesty, that does not create a moral hazard and that helps respect the rule of law while dealing in an intelligent way with the people who are undocumented. We think there's a way to do that in this step-by-step approach'.

 

 

'As long as it gets done, I don't care what it looks like' – Obama

President Obama, speaking at the same conference, told the audience that he had no objection to the House passing many separate bills providing the final result was comprehensive immigration reform.

He said 'If they want to chop that thing up into five pieces, as long as all five pieces get done, I don't care what it looks like.'


He added 'What we don't want to do is simply carve out one piece of it…but leave behind some of the tougher stuff that still needs to get done.'


US political analysts say that President Obama may owe his re-election to his support for comprehensive immigration reform. His policy was popular among Hispanic voters, the fastest-growing demographic group in the US. 80% of illegal residents in the US are thought to be of Hispanic ethnicity and many Hispanic citizens have illegal resident friends.

 

 

'Self-deportation'

Mr Romney, on the other hand, promised to make life in the US extremely uncomfortable for illegal residents. He backed a policy of 'self-deportation' which means making it so difficult for illegal residents to live and work in the US that they would rather leave the country.


Polling suggested that it may have been this policy that lost Mr Romney the election. Mr Romney polled more votes among white voters than Mr Obama but among Hispanic and Asian voters, who favour a liberal immigration policy, he did extremely badly. Mr Obama scored over 70% of Hispanic
and Asian votes.


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Australian immigration to fast track 'special investor' visas

The new Australian immigration minister Scott Morrison has said that he wants to fast-track 400 wealthy visa applicants for permanent residence. The 400 have applied for subclass 888 Significant investor visas and Mr Morrison believes that, between them, they have about AUS$2bn to invest in the Australian economy. He also says that he wants to 'reboot' the Significant Investor Visa so that it creates more Australian jobs.


The Significant Investor Visa was established in November 2012 by the previous Australian Labor government to try to attract international investment into Australia. So far, 28 Significant Investor visas have been granted. To qualify, applicants must have at least AUS$5m to invest in Australia. The investments must be made in investments approved by the Australian government.


There are another 400 people who have applied but have not yet had their applications approved. There is currently a nine-month waiting period before an applicant can receive an 888 visa but Mr Morrison says that he wants to cut this for fear that wealthy Chinese citizens will take their money elsewhere.

 

 

Morrison 'like a recruiter for a sports team'

Speaking at the Migration Institute of Australia in Sydney on Monday 21st October, Mr Morrison told his audience that he was poaching international talent 'like a recruiter for your local sports team'. He said that people who got 888 visas would 'transfer their wealth to Australia over a generation' and that their businesses would become Australian, creating jobs for Australians.


He said 'We think people who create business, people who risk capital, people who go out there every day and create jobs off their own enterprise is what we need to see more of in this country and certainly within our immigration programme'.


Mr Morrison also said that the 888 visa will be 'rebooted' so that it encourages immigrants to create Australian businesses. Writing in AM6 Technology website, Australian tech journalist James Riley said that 'there is an opportunity for Australian companies to build global products with Chinese money and an Asian footprint'.

 

 

$5m minimum investment

Under the current rules, investors must invest at least AUS$5m in an approved investment fund. They will then, after they are approved, be eligible for a Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional) (Subclass 188) visa. This will last for four years.


Providing that the investors spend at least 160 days in Australia over that four year period and maintain their investment in the approved fund, they will be able to apply for a Significant Investor permanent resident visa (subclass 888).


Global Visa Support offers a variety of programs in Australia. Please check our Australian page for more information: http://www.globalvisasupport.com/australia.html

Immigration to grow UK population by 6m in next 25 years

The UK's Office for National Statistics (ONS) says that the population of the UK is set to grow by nearly 10m over the next 25 years and calculates that 5.8m of that rise will be caused directly or indirectly by immigration.


The ONS says that its projections indicate that the UK's population should reach 68m in 2022, 70m in 2027 and 73.3m in 2037. Part of this rise will be caused by the fact that people are generally living longer. By 2037, one in 12 of the population will be over 80. There will be 111,000 people aged over 100, compared to only 13,000 today.


But the majority of the population growth is likely to be caused by immigration, the ONS believes.

 

 

Population projections used in formulating policy

The ONS carries out calculations of this sort every two years to assist policy makers in the formulation of policy. Richard Pereira, the ONS's head of population statistics, told journalists 'These population projections are used across government in terms of setting policy.


They are used by the Office of Budget Responsibility as a key input for their long-term fiscal projections. They are used by the Department for Work and Pensions for policy on benefits and pensions and they are used by people like the Department of Education'.


The ONS has based its calculations on the assumption that every year, the UK will experience net immigration of 165,000 people. Net annual immigration is calculated by subtracting the number of people who settle in the country in any given year and subtracting the number of people who leave the country permanently over the same period.

 

 

Immigration accounts directly for 43% of growth

The ONS calculations show that, over the next 25 years, net immigration is likely to increase the UK population by 4.2m. This accounts for 43% of the projected rise. However, the ONS also says that immigration will be indirectly responsible for a further 17% of the population growth over the next 25 years.


This is because the birth rate among immigrants generally tends to be higher so immigrants in the UK are likely to be responsible for an increase in the number of births. The ONS predicts that immigration, and the related increase in birth rate, will actually cause the UK population to grow by 5.8m by 2037; 60% of the total.


Almost all of the growth is predicted to take place in England rather than Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. The vast majority of immigrants to the UK settle in the south east of England.

 

 

Net immigration has fallen by 85,000 since 2010

In 2010, the UK's net annual immigration figure was 250,000 but the UK's current Coalition government has been trying to cut immigration and has so far cut it around 165,000 a year.
It has said that it intends to cut it to 100,000 per annum but a recent report published by statisticians at University College London suggests that it may prove difficult for the government to cut immigration any further without damaging the UK economy.


Before the last general election in 2010, the leader of the Conservative Party, David Cameron, said that, if he became Prime Minister, he would act to reduce net immigration below 100,000 by 2015. This remains a government target.

 

 

ONS figures subject to revision

If the government persists with its policy of reducing immigration and has any success in doing so, then the ONS will revise its estimates downwards on the next occasion that it calculates the UK's likely population growth.
 

So far, the government has

• Closed the Tier 1 (Post Study Work) visa stream. This allowed foreign graduates to work in the UK for two years after graduation.
• Closed the Tier 1 (General) visa stream. This allowed 'highly skilled people' (mostly graduates) to settle in the UK
• Introduced a cap of 20,700 on the number of Tier 2 (General) visa for skilled workers. Although the cap is never reached, employers report that it has become harder to obtain a Tier 2 (General) visa
• Removed the right of over 600 English colleges to sponsor foreign students for Tier 4 student visas
• Prevented UK citizens who earn less than £18,600 a year from bringing their foreign born spouses to live in the UK

 

 

Population rise 'could be disastrous'

The UK Independence Party candidate Amjad Bashir told The Independent newspaper 'ten million more people added to the UK population in just 25 years is staggering and it could well be disastrous'.


Anti-immigration group Migrationwatch UK called for the introduction of a 'net migration target' to help control the population growth.


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Republicans say US immigration reform bill is dead

Representative Kevin McCarthy, the Republican Party's whip in the House of Representatives ('the House') has said that there will be no vote on a comprehensive immigration reform bill in the House this year.


Representative McCarthy, from California told immigration reform activists at a meeting in Bakersfield, California, that there were not enough days left in the legislative calendar for the House to vote on the immigration reform bill that has already been passed by the Senate. Mr McCarthy said that he was 'committed' to immigration reform in 2014.


Mr McCarthy said that the House would have to vote on immigration reform by February or March at the latest or it would be 'clearly dead' because 2014 is an election year when many seats in the House will be up for re-election.

 

 

Gang of Eight

In June 2013, the Senate passed the Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Reform Act 2013 which was drafted by a group of senators known as 'the Gang of Eight'. The Gang of Eight comprised four Republicans and four Democrats. Among other reforms, the bill provided that;

• Border security with Mexico should be greatly increased
• Most people living illegally in the US should be eligible to join a 'pathway to citizenship'. Illegal residents with clean criminal records would be allowed to apply to join this pathway providing they paid a fine of $500 for being in the country illegally, learn English to a required standard and paid tax on any income earned in the US while they were in the US illegally. The 'pathway' should take at least thirteen years to complete.
• Employers would have to check all prospective employees against the 'e-Verify' database. E-Verify lists the immigration status of all known residents of the US. If someone is not listed on e-Verify or was listed as ineligible to work, then they would not be allowed to take a job
• The number of H-1B visas, temporary work visas which last three years, would be increased from the current maximum of 85,000 per year. There would be a cap of 130,000 on H-1Bs for people with bachelor's degrees (or degree equivalence) and the cap on the number of H-1Bs for graduates with higher degrees such as Master's degrees and doctorates would be removed altogether. At times of high demand, the cap for normal H-1Bs would rise to 180,000 annually.
• Graduates from US universities with higher degrees would be able to apply for US permanent resident visas (known as 'green cards'). There would be no annual cap on the number of graduates who could apply.

Under the US Constitution, a bill must be passed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives to become law. The Senate is controlled by the Democrats, President Obama's party and, because the President supports immigration reform, the Senate passed the bill with little fuss.

 

 

Amnesty would reward illegal behaviour

The House of Representatives is controlled by the opposing Republican Party. Many Republicans oppose immigration reform for a variety of reasons. They say that this is because to create 'a pathway to citizenship' for illegal residents in the US would be to grant an amnesty and reward people for their criminal behaviour in residing in the US illegally.


However, there may also be an electoral reason for Republicans to oppose the 'pathway'; most illegal residents in the US are of Hispanic descent, mostly from Mexico and from the rest of Latin America. Statistics show that Hispanic voters vote overwhelmingly for the Democrats.


However, to further complicate calculations for Republican members of the House of Representatives, polling in the US shows that 71% of US voters, including a majority of Republican voters, are in favour of the creation of the 'pathway'.

 

 

US public blames the Republicans

At the same time, Republican members of Congress have extremely high disapproval rating of 70%. To be fair, Democrats are also extremely unpopular with disapproval rating of 63%. The President too is unpopular with a disapproval rating of 58%.


The overall picture though, seems to be that most American voters, even Republican voters, blame Republicans for the recent federal government shutdown which saw many US government employees sent home from work unpaid for two weeks in October.


On top of this, polling in congressional districts (or constituencies) with small Republican majorities shows that swing voters are likely to favour immigration reform. Advocates of immigration reform suggest that Republican congressmen are likely to face an electoral massacre in 2014 unless they pass a reform bill.

 

 

It's Obama's fault – Senator Cruz

As ever in Washington, views on the matter are polarised. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas says that, if the House fails to pass immigration reform in 2013 it will be President Obama's fault. A spokesman for Senator Cruz said that it was the President's insistence that illegal residents should be able to join the 'pathway to citizenship' that is the problem.


But Kathy Bird of the Florida Immigration Coalition said 'We know that if the [republican] House leadership wants to get something done then they can. They can expand the session, work at weekends. The reality is that they don't want to. They are going pay for this next year'.


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UK announces £6m plan to help immigrants learn English

The UK's Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has announced a controversial new scheme aimed at helping immigrants with little or no English to improve their language skills.


Research has shown that traditional English language classes are not reaching those who speak poor English and so the Department for Communities and Local Government has established a programme of informal classes, often run by volunteers, to be held in temples, mosques and churches and even in supermarkets.


Pilot schemes will be held in fifteen London boroughs and in several regional towns and cities such as Manchester, Birmingham, Leicester, Sheffield, Bristol, Luton and Slough.

 

 

'Speaking English is crucial'

Community Secretary Eric Pickles said 'speaking English is crucial to allow us to come together and be part of British Society. People are unable to do this and the condemned to a limited life if they can' speak our language.


'To be a proper, functioning citizen you must be able to speak English. Those who can't are missing out on much of British society, such as participating in civic life, talking to neighbours, or popping to the shops'.


Mr Pickles said that he hoped that, by improving the language skills of new arrivals in the UK, he would also be able to reduce the bill for translation of all documents into many different languages.

 

 

Money is 'wasted' on translation services

He said 'far too much money has been wasted by councils on translation services, reducing the motivation to learn English and leaving too many people isolated at home and unable to get on.


We want to give more people the opportunities to participate fully in their communities without being held back because they can't speak the language'.


One peculiar innovation will be the recruiting of supermarket staff in Manchester and Yorkshire as 'sympathetic listeners' who will be required to listen to anyone with poor English in order to try to help them learn the language.

 

 

English and shopping

They will be identified with badges and will be expected to chat with those with poor English and also help them to do their shopping.


More than one million people in the UK have little or no English.


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