Education briefing – What does the new immigration white paper mean for education institutions?

The white paper contains a number of provisions specific to education as well as many which are not sector specific but will be of importance.

In briefing we look at the employment aspects and in our next briefing we will look at the student issues.

Some of the key takeaways from the white paper are as follows:

Skilled Workers

The Government has been concerned with an underinvestment in training the UK workforce and developing skills, and they are of the view that this has contributed to poor levels of productivity and has hindered economic growth. As part of plans to tackle this, the Government has laid out the following proposed changes, in an attempt to reduce the perceived overreliance on overseas recruitment:

• The skill level for sponsorable roles should be increased to RQF level 6 from RQF level 3 – reversing the change made by the previous Government in 2020. This approach would see the number of eligible occupations reduced by around 180 occupations. There will be transitional arrangements for those skilled workers currently sponsored in RQF level 3 roles, looking to extend.
• Salary thresholds are likely to rise - institutions will need to ensure that any recruitment needs are kept under review to ensure the new salary thresholds can be complied with – this will obviously lead to increased costs for institutions. There are likely to be transitional arrangements for those existing skilled workers extending their visas, but those switching immigration categories will be subject to the new rules.  
• Abolition of the Immigration Salary List - the Immigration Salary List should be abolished and replaced with the new Temporary Shortage List to provide time limited access to the Points-Based immigration system. Occupations below RQF level 6 will be required to be listed on the Temporary Shortage List in order to gain access to the immigration system
• Increase to Immigration Skills Charge - the Immigration Skills Charge is set to increase by 32% which will be a significant increase to sponsorship costs for those roles which are ISC liable.
• New workforce strategy requirements for key sectors - the Government will be establishing the Labour Market Evidence Group (“LME”) who will collate data on the state of the labour market. Based on the data collected by the LME, key sectors where there are high levels of recruitment from abroad, will need to produce, or update, a workforce strategy which relevant employers will be expected to comply with. This will detail steps to be taken on skills, training, and broader conditions, as well as engagement of the economically inactive domestic labour force.
• Employer incentives to boost domestic talent - the Government will explore how to ensure that employers, using the immigration system, are incentivised to invest in boosting domestic talent, including options to restrict employers sponsoring skilled visas if they are not committed to increasing skills training.

Global Talent & GAE

The white paper has made it clear that the Government is seeking to go further in ensuring that the very highly skilled have opportunities to come to the UK and access the targeted routes for the brightest and best global talent. The Government intends to achieve this by increasing the number of people arriving on the very high talent routes and introducing faster routes for bringing people to the UK who have the right skills and experience to supercharge UK growth in strategic industries.

As part of this drive the Government will seek to introduce measures relating to the following:

• Scheme for research interns - increasing places to the scheme for research interns, including those working in the field of Artificial Intelligence, to allow businesses access to additional promising young talent
• Global Talent visa - making it simpler and easier for top scientific and design talent to use the Global Talent visa

English Language Requirement

In addition, the white paper also proposed the following changes:

• Increase to English language requirement for Skilled Workers - the English language requirement could be increased for Skilled Workers and workers from B1 to B2 (Independent User) levels.
• New English language requirement for adult dependants - a new English language requirement has also been proposed for all adult dependants of workers and students at level A1 (Basic User) to align to spousal and partner routes.

Route to Settlement

• Reform to settlement and citizenship rules - there will be reform of the settlement and citizenship rules by expanding the Points-Based System and increasing the standard qualifying period for settlement to ten years. However, individuals will have the opportunity to reduce the qualifying period for settlement and citizenship based on contributions to the UK economy and society – we are awaiting further guidance on what this will mean in practice.  

HR Teams – Should start to consider:

• Which employees are in below RQF Level 6 SOC that will need to switch (potentially Graduate Route & Dependants) and consider moving to SW now
• Look at employees currently sponsored in below RQF Level 6 roles and consider extending now for a longer period
• Which employees are in roles that are being paid close to the Going Rate and/or General Threshold and may need their salary to be increased before extension
• What recruitment is planned that may be impacted
• Whether Global Talent or GAE is a better route for new hires and extenders
• Consider which employees have 5 years qualifying service to move in to ILR before the changes
• Consider whether there are employees who should be extended before the rule changes to meet the 5 year ILR requirements
• Add in to budgetary requirements the increase to salaries, the Immigration Skills Charge and longer sponsorship
• Consider a health check/audit in preparation for incoming stricter compliance measures