RETROSPECTIVE changes to the Highly Skilled Migration Programme (HSMP) which originally passed into law in 2006 will mean thousands of non-EU migrants being forced out of the UK.
The HSMP Forum, which is seeking a judicial review of these retrospective changes says that 90 per cent (44,000 people) who have entered the UK under the scheme are no longer qualified to remain here.
That amounts to 44,000 people to be deported or otherwise forced out of the UK. Not bad for a supposedly ‘anti-racist’ Labour government.
Between 2002 and the end of 2006, when the government brought in the HSMP, 49,000 doctors, engineers, accountants and other professionals entered the UK.
The change in the rules means any of them applying to extend their work visa will have to score points based on their education, salary and age, and if they do not reach the required number of points they will also have to quit the country.
The HSMP Forum says thousands have already left the UK after their visas expired, and more than a thousand others have had their applications to stay rejected.
MPs from the Joint Committee on Human Rights say that the retrospective changes were harsh, unfair, and incompatible with the Human Rights Act, and therefore illegal.
In 2007 new regulations were also brought into the health service which also saw thousands of Asian junior doctors being forced to leave Britain.
This was when NHS Trusts were told that from August they could not employ foreign doctors if there were EU doctors available.
This immediately put highly trained doctors from India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, all speaking perfect English and working for the NHS on the front line, in a position of being unable to get new jobs or new training places.
For doctors from the Indian sub-continent it meant that they could not be shortlisted for training posts, and would not be considered for new jobs, leaving them with no alternative but to return to their country of origin.
The HSMP last January was transformed into the new Points Based System (PBS).
Under this system all unskilled Asian migrants are kept out of the country, with only the very rich and the very skilled allowed to enter, but only under special conditions.
By the end of this year they will all have ID cards. They will all pay levies as soon as they enter the country for services that they may use, and they will be subjected to special points tests on a five year programme to see if they are worthy of becoming provisional British citizens, and then British citizens.
The government states that ‘Tier 1 is the first of five tiers of the PBS due to be rolled out over the next 18 months. Tier 2, targeting skilled workers with a job offer and Tier 5, for temporary workers such as musicians, actors and sportsmen will both come on line in the third quarter of 2008. Tier 4, for students, will follow at the beginning of 2009.
‘Tier 3, which covers low-skilled routes, will only be used if specific shortages are identified that cannot be filled from the UK domestic or European labour force.’
Appeal rights are going to be abolished except for those where the appeal is brought on human rights or racial discrimination grounds. The ‘appeal’ for them will be an administrative review, rather like the police investigating themselves.
British capitalism is shutting the door on the black and Asian masses in a carefully planned and conscious fashion, and embracing white, Christian, EU cheap labourers as their saviours.
British workers must reject ruling class racism. The task ahead is to unite all workers in the UK to overthrow backward and racist British capitalism and replace it with workers power and socialism.
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