Post Brexit high skill workforce migration plans to be unveiled today

Britain’s interior minister Sajid Javid is set to publish plans today for a post Brexit immigration system that would bring net migration to the UK down to “sustainable levels” in a phased approach starting in 2021. The UK Government will announce details of the new system to mark the end of free movement from other European Union countries in an immigration white paper. The plans will include a new visa route for skilled workers and no cap for high-skilled professions.

The white paper follows a report by the Migration Advisory Committee in September which recommended Britain should not give preferential treatment to EU workers in its post-Brexit immigration system but should prioritise the higher-skilled regardless of their origins. It accepts a recommendation to scrap the current limit of 20,700 on workers classed as high-skilled coming to the UK using “Tier 2” visas.

“It will be a single, skills-based immigration system built around the talent and expertise people can bring, rather than where they come from – maximising the benefits of immigration and demonstrating the UK is open for business,” Javid claims in a statement. “We are delivering on the clear instruction to get control over our borders and will bring in a new system that works in the interest of the British people. It will be a single, skills-based immigration system built around the talent and expertise people can bring, rather than where they come from – maximising the benefits of immigration and demonstrating the UK is open for business.”