Vince Cable criticises temporary (UK) immigration cap

[pampango]

Source: BBC

Mr Cable said he did not dissent from the coalition agreement between the Conservatives and Lib Dems which will see a permanent cap on non-EU immigration put in place from April.

The cap on non-EU immigration was a Conservative Party manifesto commitment but was opposed by the Liberal Democrats before the coalition government was formed. The temporary limit was announced shortly after the government took office and consultation continues on a final figure for the cap, which may be announced by the end of the year.

By speaking out ahead of the Liberal Democrat conference, he was likely to offer some comfort to those in his party who have been worried that Lib Dem ministers have not been doing enough to differentiate themselves from their Conservative colleagues.

(Labour) Shadow Business Secretary Pat McFadden said Mr Cable was "right to be resisting the proposal for an annual cap within government. The idea that a global trading nation like ours should stop talent from overseas coming to work or study here is good neither for our economy nor for our world leading position in education and research. The government is hopelessly at sea on this."

Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11338994

[alp227]

1. American conservatives: "Immigration hurts the economy, so we gotta cap it!"

Hmm, an interesting perspective from across the Atlantic. I read about this in The Guardian before here ("Vince Cable: Migrant cap is hurting economy"). Cable testified:

"We have now lots of case studies of companies which are either not investing or relocating or in many cases just not able to function effectively because they cannot get key staff – management, specialist engineers and so on – from outside the European Union.

"There's no point concealing the fact that this is actually damaging to the UK economy. It affects universities and other institutions which need access to the best people in the world.

Meanwhile, the American critical perspective of immigration is that it shuts off citizens from education and work.

[ikri]

2. The Lib Dems are apparently desparate to piss everyone off

His claims about the lack of skills are complete and utter bullshit and everyone knows it. The UK has millions unemployed right now and millions more underemployed, the EU as a whole (where there is free movement of workers) has 500 million people but apparently none of them have the skills required for business.

The truth is that the skills do exist in the UK and the wider EU. However, the workers aren't willing to accept the pathetic wages that these businesses are willing to pay. You can't hire an experienced engineer in the UK by paying them minimum wage, but you might be able to hire in someone from China or India on that wage instead.

The BBC Have Your Say comments are usually a bastion of right-wing insanity but it's worth reading the replies to this piece to see how pissed off people are with this garbage.