The State of Migration: The Challenges of Employing Migrant Workers

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Research aims:Non-EU immigrationTo assess:

• How well the government’s current policy is working for employees

• Employers’ response to the increasingly restrictive non-EU route

• The UKBA’s performance

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EU labour immigration

• Key questions:

Are migrant workers preferred to UK-born workers and why?

Why is there such a large proportion of EU workers in some industries? Is it just work ethic and skills?

If ‘work ethic’ is one of the main reasons, what does this mean?

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How?

• Survey of more than 1,000 employers, conducted with YouGov

• 16 in-depth interviews with employers across different regions, sizes and sectors. Key sectors included social care, retail, hotels, catering and leisure.

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UKBA performance:

• Employers more critical of the administrative burden than government policy:

Preparation time for an inspection

Response times following inspections

Fear of making a mistake

Quality of UKBA advice

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Policy gripes:

• Resident Labour Market Test

“I rarely, if ever, receive applicants for our positions advertised in JobCentrePlus”.

• “Cooling off period”

“The fact that you cannot return is madness. You have to think what this means … before you make offers”

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Policy recommendations:

• Drop the requirement to advertise in JobCentre Plus as part of the Resident Labour Market Test

• Should the MAC be given a role in overseeing the administrative impact of the policy?

• Retain shortage occupation routes.

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Policy recommendations (Contd.)• Relax restrictions around extending visas, especially in

relation to Tier 5 or even Tier 1

• Re-open post-study worker route for growth sectors/ STEM subjects

• Freeze Tier 2 visas for the lifetime of the Parliament

• Remove ‘cooling off’ period for those earning 70k or more

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Growth in number of non-UK born workers in low-skilled roles:

And the reasons?

• Skills

• Work ethic

Unsocial hours (weekend work, night shifts): “They [migrant workers] are happy to try their hand at anything”

• Larger labour supply from EU

• Employee job referrals

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Recruitment consultancies

• Nearly a third of private sector employers use them to hire MWs

• Several cases of active recruitment from host country

• Relationship between very high proportion of migrant workers and use of agencies for unskilled work

“They [recruitment agencies] are exclusively there to

recruit migrant workers”

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High attrition rates among UK-born workers• Poor image of the sectors, especially in retail, hotels

and catering and leisure

• Pay and employment conditions

“It’s difficult to compete with Tesco down the road”

• Failure of employers to sell potential progression paths, especially for job-entry roles.

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