20th February 2011

I only employ one person these days: an Australian, Anne. Between us, Anne and I are responsible for the HR of a drinks business which has gone from startup to 300 employees across 17 countries in a little over two years. She works full time or more at their office in West London. When Anne first started working with me she held an Australian working visa but we pretty soon had to validate her first appointment to the satisfaction of the UK Border Agency through their sponsorship procedures, the Kafkaesque workings of which led to me spending a couple of thousand pounds on legal fees rather than risk a nervous breakdown trying to do it myself. Part of this required me to advertise the post, screen the forty odd applicants and interview a shortlist of around 6 of the best, including Anne. On Wednesday of this week, Anne and I have to give a day to a meeting with two officers from UKBA to check my recruitment and employment processes and make sure that I’m not cheating a good European out of a job by employing her. They’ve helpfully made it clear that she will be deported rather quickly if they find me at fault.

I’m quite lucky, it seems. Anne’s employment began under the old immigration rules where I’m only required to demonstrate that Anne was the best candidate for the job when I selected her. More recent changes by the current government have changed the standard such that I would these days have to demonstrate that none of the European candidates could do the job that Anne now holds. Even if she was the best candidate, I’m told that I would have to give the job to someone else if they could demonstrate at interview that they were capable of performing the role.

I’m being forced through this fuckwittery by the Tory’s promise to Middle England in the election to ‘deal’ with immigration. Tickling the tummy of the rabid retired, they pledged to cut annual net immigration from around 200,000 (the rate which the Office for National Statistics shows as being the norm since about 2000) to ‘tens of thousands’. Anne and I are at the sharp end of the government’s attempt to honour that pledge and since the vast majority of the net immigration figure is comprised of Europeans and returning British people who the government can’t stop coming here, the likes of Anne are particularly squeezed. Since November 2010 only 20,700 people like Anne can come and work in the UK every year. Lawyers and bankers in particular have pointed out the lunacy of preventing clever people coming to work here and the restriction was quietly eased last week. The smart money says that further ‘easing’ will come when the Daily Mail is looking the other way.

Caught between a daft election pledge and economic sense, the government’s new target is the Universities. More than half non-European migrants to the UK are students attracted by our generally good colleges and the fact that we speak, um, English. Damien Green, Immigration Minister, has signposted changes in March which will restrict their entry. Actually, many changes have already been made for people wanting to study here. The Economist reports the number of ‘approved’ colleges has been reduced from 12,000 to 2,200 by March 2009 and language requirements have become more stringent, so it’s hard to see where Mr. Green is going to make further reductions without some damaging surgery. With estimates putting the value of overseas students to the UK economy at £10 billion and ranking Higher Education as our seventh biggest export, phrases like baby and bathwater spring to mind. Contributing to a careers event at my old University last week, this was the unsurprising topic of conversation from the Chinese, Indian, Brazilian, Korean and other nationalities that make up around 40% of this year’s MBA cohort.

I’m not pro-Australian or anti-European. I’m very, very pro-Anne. I guess she and I are lucky because we are only having to devote time and money to prove what we already know: she does an exceptional job in circumstances that many would find impossible. In their haste to pull up the drawbridge on this cold, wet rock in the North Sea the government is on the wrong side of the argument. Immigration of talented and able people like Anne supports our economy. Excluding them is just daft.