Low-skilled migrant workers will be asked to leave UK

Published January 31, 2012 4:50pm

Under new policies, immigrants from outside Europe who do not have valuable skills or high earnings will lose their right to live permanently in the United Kingdom, a report of the Daily Mail said on Monday.

The report said a "transformation of immigration policy will leave room for only the brightest and best to build new lives in Britain." Previously, skilled workers with work visas may stay permanently after five years if their employers want to keep them.

Under existing rules, some "60,000 skilled workers a year, including chefs and nurses, win the right to permanent settlement," the report said.

The Daily Mail quoted Immigration Minister Damian Green as saying: "We want permanently to make Britain the most attractive country in the world for the brightest and the best. The era of mass immigration is over." In the future holders of work visas "will find it more difficult to win the right to stay permanently," Green said.

The new policies, expected to be made public this week allow only those earning more than £35,000 a year should have the right to settle permanently in Britain.

Addressing prospective immigrants, Green said: "You have to show genuine serious usefulness to British society." He explaiend that UK will make it easier for exceptional persons to live in the UK.

Green said he "hoped to encourage into Britain a new generation of the skilled, the highly talented – the bright young things – the brightest and the best from all around the world."

There would be a separate route into Britain for the exceptionally talented in the arts, including dancers, actors, artists and musicians, the report said. - VVP, GMA News

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