UK government considers visa restrictions for technicians to curb migration

LONDON: The UK government is considering tightening visa rules for hiring foreign workers in the IT, telecommunications and engineering professionals to fill jobs in the UK in an attempt to reduce the high level emigration.
Every year thousands of Indian IT and engineering professionals travel to the UK to work in these sectors, filling crucial gaps in job market.
Changes could include raising the minimum wage threshold in these sectors or restrictions based on different regions of the UK.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has written to Brian Bell, chairman of the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC), asking him to look into the reasons behind the reliance on international recruitment in the “IT, telecommunications and engineering” sectors.
“These sectors are in the top ten sectors that are reliant on international recruitment and the government would like the MAC to set out the reasons for this. The high level of international recruitment reflects weaknesses in the labour market, including persistent skills shortages in the UK,” she wrote.
She asked the MAC what was causing the labour shortage and “how are sectors seeking to respond to these shortages, apart from recruiting from abroad?”
“What political levers within immigration system could be used to encourage sectors to focus on recruiting from the domestic workforce,” she said, adding that the system was “not working in the national interest”.
The MAC report is due in nine months. Ganapati Bhat, an IT consultant from Bengaluru who has been working in the UK since 2007 after coming under the highly skilled migrant programme, told TOI, “There is no need to change the policy just because there is a buzz around immigration. We are finding it difficult to fill vacancies in the UK as salaries in some positions are not that high compared to India and the US, considering the cost of living.”