UK government has announced emergency temporary work visas

30 Sep 2021, 01 mins ago

The UK government has announced the creation of thousands of emergency temporary work visas to address critical labour shortages in the haulage and food processing industries.

Unsurprisingly, other sectors are now pressing vocally for their workforce shortfalls to be addressed in the same way- with hospitality and the care sector spearheading the charge.

But will this kind of emergency immigration route really solve anyone’s problems?

The first question is – will applicants actually apply in any numbers? The government’s two announcements were both for 3-month visa routes, ending on 24th December.

And a happy Christmas to you too…

We may find the appeal of the warm welcome we offer to migrant workers in the UK is wearing a little thin.

And the second question – if these new visa routes do attract the thousands of applicants that sectors say they need, will the Home Office have the resources to process these? And how long will it take?

The Government’s announcements referred to using the Temporary Worker visa route for these new visa categories. Visas under this route standardly take at least 3 weeks to obtain, potentially several weeks more if the applicant is not European and has to attend a visa appointment. That could well mean that applicants to this 3-month emergency visa will arrive just about in time for the Christmas break.

So if each industry only gets its own special visa, but only when it can persuade the government that it’s hitting crisis point, then what we’re planning for is not a long-term solution for labour shortages, not even a temporary measure to tide industry over while they make the transition to a post-Brexit, post-Covid economy, but a series of crises – and very public ones, as whoever calls the biggest crisis gets the biggest visa allocation.

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