1.0 Introduction
Migration was a defining topic in the UK’s referendum on EU integration. Post Brexit will see a new era of immigration policy that no longer distinguishes between non-EU and EU nationals and will be tailored to the UK’s needs. Currently, as observed by Office for National Statistics (ONS), inward migration level in the UK has been increasing over the past decade and the net migration has been positive every year since 1994. In 2004, the EU migrants level in the UK became significant due to the substantial inflows of workers from Central Europe with ten new entrants from the region joining the union. This is resulted from the UK opened its door for labour market access for the new member states which allowed free movement of workers. Furthermore, those migrating to pursue work in the UK has been mostly of lower skills especially from Central and Eastern European countries. This trend of rising migration into Britain has caused public concerns. Recently, Prime Minister Theresa May has urged to slash net migration and defended moves to restrict EU migration specifically on unskilled workers. However, these plans by the policy maker must also consider the preferences from other interest groups in the demand side of immigration policy such as businesses.
2.0 Impact of Migration on the UK
2.1 Wages
Reed and Latorre (2009) analysed the impact of immigration on wages in UK based on the time series 1995 – 2000. Reed and Latorre (2009) found that a 1% increase in migrants in the UK causes wage to fall by 0.3%. However, Dustmann, Frattiniand and Preston (2013) which studied a period of 1997 – 2005 added that it is in the case where migrants are close substitutes to the natives that a 10% add up to migrants causes wage to fall by 0.3% on average. The study further added that in the unskilled labour market the same increase will cause a more than double fall in wages by 2%. Although these studies suggested the mentioned impact, no gradual or significant impact has happened to UK wages. It is observed that nominal wage in the UK actually increases, whilst real wages has not been fluctuating significantly.
2.2 Housing
Migration contributes to demand for housing through its contribution to population growth. Given that the problem in the UK is that demand for housing has been growing faster than the supply (Barker, 2004), migration may be expected to increase housing costs. Furthermore, immigrants are likely to choose rentable properties. According to Oxford Migration survey in 2015, 74% of recent migrants (those who have been in the UK for five years or less) were in the private rented sector. Thus, overall increase in the number of households and rentable demand will put upward pressure on house prices too; strong demand for renting has increased number of buy to let landlords looking to profit from rising demand and rising rents. However, some studies have addressed this question by comparing house prices in areas with lower and higher levels of migration. They found, counterintuitively, that migration to a local area led to a decrease in house prices. Using data from 2003 to 2010 for UK, Sá (2014) found that a 1% increase in the stock of the foreign-born relative to the local population led to a decrease of 1.7% in house prices. Nonetheless, these results are explained in part by the out-migration of UK-born people from areas with increasing in-migration, which reduces the demand for houses there. The Migration Advisory Committee (2014) has argued that while migration may be associated with house price decreases at the local level, the out-migration of UK nationals to other areas could mean that on average, migration increases house prices across the UK as a whole.
2.3 Healthcare (NHS)
According to the statistics gathered by Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), The statistics, gathered by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC), show that 11% of all staff who work for the NHS and in community health services are not British. The proportion of foreign nationals increases for professionally qualified clinical staff (14%) and even more so for doctors (26%). In relation to this, it shows that migrants have been contributing to a remarkable of the UK’s medical workforce labour (). Therefore, with the demand for healthcare rises, the UK will need inflows migrant doctors and nurses.
3.0 Attitude Towards Migration
Conclusive evidence on UK attitudes comes from the British Social Attitudes Survey run by the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen), which has tracked public attitudes since 1983. In the UK sample, nearly 7 out of 10 respondents (69%) thought that immigration levels should be decreased, while only 5% thought that they should be increased.
In addition, a survey conducted by Transatlantic Trends in 2014 asked whether people were concerned about the levels of immigration from both within and outside the EU. The levels of concern about EU and non-EU immigration were roughly similar in the UK.
Spousal reunion migrants were the most negatively viewed by this measure, with 14% seeing them as bringing more benefit than cost, against 57% seeing such migrants as bringing more cost than benefit.
Furthermore, European Social Survey (2012) gathered the opinions of the natives of 21 European countries which includes the UK on their attitudes towards professional and unskilled labourers from non-EU countries to come and live in their respective countries. It is shown that the UK public prefer less unskilled migrants than professionals.
Moreover, Sagar and Drean (2001) found that opposition to immigration varies by demographic groups as their paper concludes that British population are significantly more likely to be hostile to migrants and minorities if they are older (65 years of age), poorer or less well educated. The study also considered the role of media in shaping public attitudes towards immigration and the findings was based on several public opinion surveys. This can also be observed by the data Citizenships Survey had gathered.
4.0 Immigration Policies
Following Brexit, immigration policy should be improvised to focus on reducing excessive net migration, as well as retain higher skill workers and reduce lower skill workers. As the UK is a demand-led labour market (Clancy, 2009), the immigration policy targets to retain this higher skills labour that are essential in sustaining the workforce. Furthermore, policies should meet the preferences of the countries’ interest groups including the UK natives, businesses and employers.
4.1 Regional Immigration Policy
London has received significant inflow of migration, with net gains of 800 thousand migrants since 1998, have generated overall population growth and more cosmopolitan mix in the city (Holmans and Kaplanis, 2007) and the notable inward migration can also be related to other major cities in the UK. Therefore, in this case, the UK should consider adopting regional immigration policy by Canada which has been effective. Regional policy which is included in Canada’s points-based immigration system has been implemented in the country to adjust gaps between the economics, demographics and the cultural condition of each regions. Thus, this allows for regional policy which varies by province and immigration controls to take place.
Region-specific requirements for immigrants should be set in all UK provinces. This allows the administration to identify labour shortages in particular industries and field within their area, as well as restricting the pressure put on any one region. Furthermore, unemployment rate in the regional labour market should be taken into consideration as this reflects the surplus of labour in that specific region or lesser job opportunities that does not require additional workforce into the province. For example, the UK’s North East and London are recorded as the two regions with the highest unemployment rate in the first quarter of 2017 (ONS, 2017).
In addition, to ensure that the policy meets its objectives, it will require migrants to live within the particular province which has approved their visa until they become eligible to apply for citizenship. Therefore, the gaps of each region will be filled by the migrants which they intend to seek for UK citizenship. Besides that, the regional system aims to draw migration away from capitals and other large cities, instead of sustaining it. Thus, this may also address the problem of overpopulation in metropolitan areas that causes a high housing demand and massive pressure on public services such as schools and hospitals.
4.2 Improvisation of Points-Based System
Points systems appeal to policymakers because they are transparent, flexible and can be adjusted to meet evolving economic needs or respond to evidence on immigrants' integration outcomes (Kelly, 2016). The current UK’s points based system can be improvised and the 5-tier structure to be retained in order to categorize the migrants’ immigration status as well. Firstly, to maintain the demand for highly skilled labour in various sectors such as engineering, science and medicine, there should not be a tight restriction on this visa type. For instance, the current PBS which includes Exceptional Talent and generally for highly skilled migrants can only qualify for permanent residence if the migrant has spent a continuous period of five years in the UK. The policy shall be reduced to a minimum of 1 year skilled work experience as implemented under Canada’s points-based system, Federal Skilled Workers that includes ‘adaptability’ factor which contributes to earning points. Thus, desirable criterias for the points-based system shall be revised to meet UK’s economic needs by being open to welcome and committed in retaining high skilled labour and talents post Brexit as a high priority.
Besides that, Family Reunion is to be included in the structure of immigration policy. The right for spouses or relatives to reside in the UK is only to be granted for migrants who have been permanent resident and not for Students and Temporary Workers. However, a policy that can be implemented for the other visa types apart from permanent residence is allowing spouses to live in the UK temporarily, for example, a maximum of 3 months visa for every 2 years. Therefore, with this policy, it addresses the negative view of the public on the spousal reunion migrants as discussed earlier. It will also have an impact on the net migration to be reduce.