Policy Exchange - Immigration After Brexit

1 Feb 2018 09:14 AM

A post-Brexit immigration system should clamp down on low-skilled EU immigration but adopt a lighter-touch approach for students and professionals, argues Policy Exchange’s Head of Demography, Immigration and Integration, David Goodhart, in a new paper Immigration After Brexit.

As Britain considers its long-term immigration needs, there is scope to maintain a high level of continuity for groups such as EU students and tourists. There should be a customised “light touch” work permit system for EU professionals and — as Britain weans itself off low-skilled migration — there should be priority for low skilled workers ready to work antisocial hours, thereby acting more as complements than direct competitors to the British workforce. The paper argues that:

David Goodhart said:

“A Brexit without a clear end to free movement in its current form is neither possible nor desirable as it was clearly one of the biggest single factors behind the Brexit vote.

“One of the problems with freedom of movement is that it has created a new category of resident: someone who is neither a temporary visitor, such as a tourist, nor someone who is making a permanent commitment to a new country in the manner of the traditional immigrant. Many of those taking advantage of free movement in recent years have enjoyed the rights of the latter with the attitude of the former.

“Whilst we welcome an end to freedom of movement, a good post-Brexit immigration deal should maintain a lot of continuity in the movement of people, especially for students and professionals, and we can open up several new temporary work routes. There’s no reason for arrangements to change around tourists and students from the EU, but we do need to see a general reduction in the number of low skilled workers.

“The Government, in partnership with industry and the Migration Advisory Committee, needs to set out how they will gradually reduce low skilled immigration from the EU, whilst maintaining a route for workers coming to do jobs with antisocial hours.”