Business Immigration Update: Review of IT & Engineering Sectors

In this article Pam Sidhu, Partner and Head of Business Immigration, reports on the government’s recent statement announcing important policy updates, including the role of the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC).

Firstly, in line with Labour’s election manifesto, the Home Secretary has confirmed that the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) will be strengthened and will work with Skills England, the Industrial Strategy Council and the Labour Market Advisory Board as part of a new framework to support a “coherent approach to skills, migration and labour market policy”. These bodies will work with the devolved governments to tackle labour market challenges across the UK.

In addition, MAC has been commissioned to review the UK’s current reliance on overseas workers in both the IT and engineering sectors, with a particular focus on:

• The types of roles in shortage and the reasons for these shortages such as training, pay and conditions.
• How sectors have responded to these shortages apart from seeking to recruit from overseas.
• The impact of these roles being on the shortage occupation list has had on these sectors.
• What policy controls within the immigration system could be used to incentivise recruitment from the domestic workforce.

At the same time, the Home Secretary has confirmed the following changes introduced by the Conservative government will continue to be implemented:

• The increased minimum salary thresholds for Skilled Worker visas.
• Abolishment of the 20% discount to the salary going rate for workers in shortage occupations (including roles in IT and engineering).
• Restrictions on most overseas students’ ability to bring family members to the UK.
• Restrictions on care workers’ ability to bring dependants to the UK.
• Measures to regulate the recruitment of international students.

Pam Sidhu comments:

“The findings and recommendations of the MAC review of the IT and engineering sectors are not expected any time soon due to a timeframe of 9 months having been given for its report. We await the findings with interest. Our experience of employers we work with in these sectors is that they are heavily reliant on overseas workers because the skills simply do not exist in the UK. This raises complex issues, as clearly businesses will struggle to deliver key projects without the appropriate workforce, which in turn could hamper the UK economy.

Therefore the government will need to tread with care, especially as we have already had major restrictions introduced by the Conservatives in April 2024, including a 48% increase to minimum salary thresholds for overseas workers. The question is how much further will the Labour government go, in order to restrict legal migration that businesses say they clearly need?”

For more information or to discuss any business immigration query, please contact our Partner and Head of Business Immigration, Pam Sidhu, on 0121 233 4333 or by email at [email protected].