By Andy McCue, 8 March 2006 12:35
NEWS
The UK IT industry has welcomed the government's new points-based immigration system, saying it will make it easier for businesses to fill genuine IT shortages by recruiting skilled workers from overseas.
The new five-tier system, which is expected to come into force from the middle of next year, will award points to those applying for visas and work permits based on qualifications, experience and age. Only those achieving the target points for their tier will get a work permit.
Most overseas IT workers will fall into the top two tiers, covering 'highly-skilled' workers - such as entrepreneurs, doctors and IT specialists - who will be able to get a visa without a firm job offer, and 'skilled' migrants, with less specialised engineering and IT skills, who will need a job offer from the UK.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke said: "This new system will give employers and educational institutions a stronger role in the managed migration system and will introduce a more transparent and objective method of points-based structured decision-making."
UK IT industry body Intellect welcomed the new points-based system as a "positive" move by the government.
Nick Kalisperas, director of public sector at Intellect, told silicon.com: "It's a step in the right direction. It's important there is recognition that the industry needs staff from outside the EU."
But he said this is only part of the answer to addressing the shortage of some IT skills in the UK. "More needs to be done in terms of retraining, more in terms of attracting women into the IT workforce and more in making IT an attractive discipline and career option for students," he said.
The UK's Professional Contractors Group (PCG) also welcomed the new points-based system and said it will help stop companies hiring workers from overseas except where there is a genuine skills gap.
PCG chairman Simon Juden said in a statement: "Allowing the easy exploitation of workers from overseas might make for short-term cost savings but is not conducive to developing the skills of knowledge workers in the UK."
Comments
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1. anonymous
I find it difficult to believe that there is a shortage of skilled IT people in the UK. Applications for a post within my organisation for an IT Technician exceeded 120 applications.
I think it's more a case of we'll get someone in from aboard as it is cheaper, after all why pay £30K for a UK employee when you can get someone with the same skills for £15K from aboard.
This also has the knock on effect of reducing the potential growth in salaries within the IT sector.
UK Companies are dilberately advertising IT posts at extremely low salaries then crying skills shortage. Advertise the right money and there is no shortage.
2. Richard Sheppard
Which skills gap?
At a recent government conference, the head of e-Skills spoke about the "skills gap."
However, each questioner from the audience had a different idea about which skills were in shortage.
Some speakers wanted highly specific specialists; some wanted general support staff; but some just wanted all employees to use their PCs better.
Unfortunately, most speakers wanted to obtain fully trained workers from elsewhere: Very few spoke about training their own staff!
3. Iain Benger-Stevenson
And, of course, there will be a rigorous check on the claimed skills and qualifications?
The NHS has been reported to be using foreign doctors, with an increase in the numbers of botched operations.
Is there not a danger of "cheap labour" being called in, just as in the Fast Track visa schemes, where there are good people still unemployed?
4. anonymous
Same old rubbish just a sop to indigenous workers, it will be used to import cheap labour as employers here don't want to train anyone. IT has become just a hire-and-fire job, no longer a career. I would advise anyone not to go into IT it is a dead-end and getting worse. There is no skills xhortage as I have said for years. I take the employers will have to prove there is no suitable local/ indigenous peole available first as in USA, CANADA, etc?
5. anonymous
There is no skills gap. Just a salary gap between us and the third world. A scheme that forced IT companies to pay foreign workers the same as their UK counterparts would end the debate for good I think.
6. Philip Virgo
There are no longer generic IT skills shortages in the UK.
The average salaries on offer for jobs which do not require specific applications or industry experience have not kept pace with inflations over the last couple of years.
The main exceptions are project management and information systems security.
There are also ongoing shortages of those with the skills to handle the people (as opposed to technology) of information systems planning, development, implementation and operation. That is because thse have been neglected for nearly twenty years
Philip Virgo
Strategic Advisor to the
Inititute for the Manangment of Information Systems
7. Sarah
So if I wanted to go and work in the USA or Canada, I can just walk in to a job over there (because of my skill set)?
Of course not. Because they have policies that protect their existing population first.
Unlike the UK of course .....
8. M Evans
Just look at the number of IT firms making people redundant between Reading and Bracknell? HP, Cable and Wireless, etc. Where are these people to find jobs? There are already huge numbers of "self employed" (ie. no point in claiming limited benifits) IT workers) in this area. So all these incomming IT workers will take any jobs going, and I and the others will carry on doing the night repenishment shift at Sainburys, Tescos et al...
9. Marc Wilson
The "Skills Shortage" is in fact a shortage of highly-skilled, experienced technical specialists who will work for shelf-stacker wages.
If you look at the paucity of job ads for IT people and compare that with this alleged "skills gap", there's actually a credibility gap.
If there is a gap anywhere, it's for "third-tier" people with IT experience; helpdesk staff, general users- and I agree that the school system is not yet turning out IT-aware people (Doom does not count) with any depth of understanding, and the feeble courses that get you up to speed on Word, Excel and Outlook aren't really a broad IT education either.