RFI: UK Immigration Policy

You need to do this to buy premiums bonds as well see days, it's a massive pain in the neck.

At least an American won't have to do a language test on top of everything else.

Do you really? I was about to buy some premium bonds, luckily my friends are middler-classier than me.

I had to provide a certified copy of my passport (signed by a community member of good standing) as proof of ID and a bank statement as proof of address but i might just have been unlucky. Idk if they select a certain proportion to scrutinise or if they do it to everyone.

I bought some for my godson as a christening present a few years back and the only thing that annoyed me was that I had to get my mum to do it as being grandparent is acceptable to buy a present on behalf of a child and being an aunt isn't.

I was lucky with the 'professional people' thing because at the time I applied I had been working at the same small company for a few years and could get the CEO/director to vouch for me. But I imagine a lot of people struggle with it, as if anyone needs more crap to worry about on top of the money they have to conjure for the whole process. The paperwork etc from my arrival in the UK to my full citizenship cost over 3000 pounds, which is just an insane amount of money, even if it is spread over a few years.

http://i.imgur.com/EYu5Tzo.png

Worth remembering that he was "convicted" without having been arrested, put on trial or given any kind of formal sentence.

he should come to the uk and perform a crime (the more spurious the better) here, so he has to stay for longer to be put on trial, lol

Landlords could face up to five years in jail for letting properties to undocumented migrants - or failing to check whether the people they let to have the legal right to remain in the country.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/aug/03/illegal-immigrants-face-eviction-without-court-order-under-plans-to-discourage-migrants

The degree to which the government has farmed enforcement out to non-professionals is often underestimated. Landlords must act as immigration officials or face jail, universities have to or face financial ruin, lorry drivers are automatically responsible for anyone caught in their vehicles, etc. Trucking companies have been fined nearly £7m this year, iirc, for failing to secure their lorries against stowaways.

This might be the most incoherent policy yet:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-33750709

Labour and the Conservatives both pledged that anyone in a public-facing role in the state sector must have an appropriate level of English and could lose their jobs if they failed to meet that benchmark but i think this is the first time the actual benchmark has been identified. They have chose proficiency in English equivalent to "GCSE grace C". This is odd for a number of reasons.

There are lots of different ways to measure English proficiency for speakers of other languages and GCSEs aren't really one of them. They are designed with native speakers in mind and might reflect core competencies but don't assess them in a formal way. They are not ESOL tests. The guide used for visas in the UK and by every other ministry i can think of across Europe (Polish Civil Service, Greek Civil Service, Italian Ministry of Education, etc) is the Common European Framework of Reference.

I'll skip the technical details but the upshot is that to work in any customer-facing role, you'd need a level of English broadly comparable to the requirements for Highly Skilled migrant visas and most MBA courses and higher than the entry point for almost every undergraduate degree in the country. Given that 39% of British people fail to get a C grade in GCSE English, i'm not sure what is expected.

The most absurd element of all is that the initial documents seem to suggest it will be up to managers to determine how to check the English levels of their staff.

that's before you take into account that in a couple of years GCSE grading is going to change to an "interesting" new 9-1 scheme

http://www.aqa.org.uk/supporting-education/policy/gcse-and-a-level-changes/structure-of-new-gcses/explaining-new-gcse-grades-transcript

i'm not even gonna get into the serious issues with English and Maths teaching at post-16 because professional discretion but let's just say in brief there are nowhere near enough teachers to meet demand from the government for continuing study for pupils who haven't achieved GCSE passes at school

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-cameron-says-migrant-families-could-be-broken-up-and-mothers-deported-if-they-fail-new-english-a6818631.html

The government has just announced some kind of fund targeted at helping Muslim women learn English on nat sec grounds, which would not have been necessary has they not bulldozed the existing funds for migrants looking to improve their language skills. Presumably if you are not a Muslim woman, you are still out of luck.

As ever, there's no detail on the level of English required, or the process. To get a spouse visa / further leave to remain, you already need to be able to pass an English test at the A1 level, the reference to toughening up the system and to demonstrating your level of English is "improving" suggests it'll be another test at a higher level.

The plans to deport anyone not earning £35,000 after five years continue to roll on:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-urged-to-rethink-new-35000-earnings-threshold-for-non-eu-migrants-as-teachers-face-a6814841.html

was on radio4 this morning. interviewer pointed out that it was same government (albeit in coalition) that removed the funding in the first place.

Good luck being a dyslexic Muslim woman (or related to one) in 2016.

I think / hope they'll stick with the format of testing speaking and listening only, rather than reading and writing, as there's probably a recognition that literacy and English ability aren't interchangeable but it certainly makes things harder for people learning the language with minimal support.

The income threshold blows me away. Is that per person or per family?

Per person. Nurses are temporarily exempted but teachers, etc are not aiui.

Wow. That would be higher than the average UK salary.

50% higher

...than median household income, £7.5k above average salary apparently

That'll be fun, keeping tabs on thousands of people's incomes for years after they've arrived, sounds like a good use of resources

The best case scenario is that this is all about cheap headline chasing and they don't intend to follow through on it, but who the fuck knows any more.

Wow. That would be higher than the average UK salary.

― droit au butt (Euler), Monday, 18 January 2016 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Don't be surprised - value is to be measured in a number always and 4evah.

Although this does apply to migrants outside the EU. Plenty of cheap labour to be obtained from the inside of it?

That's true.

My wife was just pointing out that this could be seen as just another instance of colonialism: poach valuable talent from other countries like one used to poach valuable resources from them.

But it's more complex than that, because these are people, who presumably want to emigrate to the UK. We're not talking slavery here.

But slaves to capital?

I don't know.

Keeps out the riff raff.

And don't forget, for £7400 you can get "Super Premium" service, where immigration officials visit a location you specify and give you an answer within 24 hours:
https://www.gov.uk/ukvi-premium-service-centres/use-the-super-premium-service

xp

There are some countries that have identified 'brain drain' as a pressing economic problem but the reverse of that is the remittances that come from overseas workers, which account for up to 30% of the GDP of countries like Nepal and Moldova and pay for the domestic higher-ed opportunities of family members elsewhere.

It's not as though people are going to stop emigrating, they're just going to do worse jobs for less money in other countries.

Yes, that's true. Still, it divides families: only the wage earner can stay in the UK for more than five years.

And the Nepalese need doctors too.

And might not their staying in Nepal contribute to a development of the Nepalese economy?

And who ought to make these decisions?

xp on the ELT stuff.

The government has just announced some kind of fund targeted at helping Muslim women learn English on nat sec grounds, which would not have been necessary has they not bulldozed the existing funds for migrants looking to improve their language skills. Presumably if you are not a Muslim woman, you are still out of luck.

As ever, there's no detail on the level of English required, or the process. To get a spouse visa / further leave to remain, you already need to be able to pass an English test at the A1 level, the reference to toughening up the system and to demonstrating your level of English is "improving" suggests it'll be another test at a higher level.

This is classic Cameron, isn't it? They announced something similar in 2011, when the people expected to deliver this pointed out that funding had been cut. Empty announcement designed to get a lot of noise in the press - it feels with a bit of luck like it might be one of a number of Cameron announcements that just never happens ie what Matt DC said.

Yes, that's true. Still, it divides families: only the wage earner can stay in the UK for more than five years.

And the Nepalese need doctors too.

And might not their staying in Nepal contribute to a development of the Nepalese economy?

And who ought to make these decisions?

Who can make them other than the individuals concerned?

Under the points-based system, dependents can be eligible for visas.

Doctors will typically earn more than £35k so aren't necessarily a great example but the options are typically not a) come to the UK or b) stay in X. You have a lot of very qualified people driving cabs or working on building sites in Dubai. There's nothing much, apart from North Korea style bans on travelling overseas, that countries can do to stop it.

The main objections around the £35k minimum from a practical perspective are that it's not based on need. It cuts off the possibility of recruiting across whole sections of industry that might be experiencing skills shortages but don't pay substantially higher than the average wage.

The main objection from a human perspective is that it's going to apply to people who have built a life in the UK over the course of a number of years and are going to get kicked out at the end based solely on their salary.

How long do they get to reach that level of salary?

(The 35k figure looks like a pipe dream for me, it's at least a decade away even if ever get there ... struggling to get head round the idea that anyone should have to earn this much to be worthy to stay)

Five years, then you're out.

jeez

Will this affect people who already live here?

Yes, that's my understanding.

I don't see how it's possible to round up a bunch of people who have been ILR for years and years, who have paid as much tax as any British citizen on their income, and who have been entitled to the same programme of benefits etc. How is this even workable after the five years required to qualify for ILR?

It does sound like an unworkable mess, but I wouldn't be shocked if the tories attempt to implement it. Feels very Trumpish. Very sorry for everyone who has this hanging over their heads.

The ludicrous policy of trying to get net immigration down to 'tens of thousands' from 250k+ is at the heart of all this nonsense. It's essentially impossible - despite their best efforts they haven't prevented the university sector from recruiting foreign students, they have zero control over EU immigration and, in the one area they can actually influence (Tier 2 skilled migration), numbers have actually gone up iirc, partly due to the skills gap in the tech sector and positioning of London as the no.1 financial services hub in the world. Pretty much the only thing that they can do is announce cruel, stupid things in the hope that they're perceived to be cracking down.

This is me, isn't it? People on EEA-2s and EEA-4s?

I think that EEA2/4 are not covered. Non-EU partners of EU workers tend to get preferential treatment over non-EU partners of British nationals, but I'm not an expert.

You are probably good until the referendum.

I just have no-frills ILR, granted in 1995 after four years of renewing my visa (and before all these ~categories~ were invented). If they want to apply this to people who've been here *forever*, does that in effect mean a huge number of long-time British taxpayers will risk deportation if they have the audacity to lose a job or fall ill? A new layer of insecurity isn't exactly what anyone having a Very Special Freelancer's January needs right now.

lol :(

There's no way they can go that far, right? This retrospective bullshit is about as practical as kicking out all the French people living here if the EU referendum passes (or fails, I'm not sure which way the question will be phrased you know what I mean). Which they also wouldn't do, right? Right?

Reviewing the 2012 policy docs, it looks like it's effective for Tier 2 visa holders who started after the 6th of April 2011. Anyone before that should be ok.

Is this an example of the new rules coming into force, or something else:

https://kingstonshakespeareseminar.wordpress.com/2016/01/25/shameful-start-to-shakespeare-400-dr-paul-hamilton-arrested-and-held-by-uk-immigration/

Something else. This is how a lot of people who have recently finished studying get treated.

it's pretty diabolical. almost amusingly egregious.

No expert here but there seems to be a lot of worth in the common idea that 'If you make controls on immigration stricter and stricter, you're only going to penalise well-meaning people who haven't done anything wrong, because they're the easiest to track down'?

Pretty damning:

http://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2016/03/23/disaster-for-theresa-may-as-legal-ruling-brings-student-depo

I probably shouldn't say too much about this off 77 but I think the vast majority were probably cheating though it's very possible honest candidates were unjustly impacted.

Also fairly sure that voice recognition, which was the public justification for the dragnet and the point at which the Home Office defence fell down at tribunal, had next to nothing to do with anything.

Well, a vague feeling that the vast majority were probably cheating was all the government had to go on, so ur in good(?) company.

Altho I'd say even the cheating candidates were unjustly impacted tbh