Home >> Europe >> Great Britain  Email  Print Why the Skilled Won't Stay in Britain Safdar Jafri - 4/29/2008 HSMP, Highly Skilled Migration Program, was introduced in Britain in 2002 to attract skilled people from around the world to boost UK's skill-starved, dwindling economy in need of a shot in the arm. A good program in the sense that it only concentrated on highly skilled as Britain was already witnessing a deluge of low skilled workers from the Eastern European countries such as Poland. As of today, there are at least 1 million Eastern European low skilled workers in Britain. So, skilled is what UK needed, specially when its own skilled persons have been emigrating from the UK in search of greener pastures abroad in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and even Spain, France and Portugal. According to a report published in the Daily Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/21/nexodus121.xml) Britain has been experiencing the worst brain drain of any country as highly qualified settle abroad. Presently, over 3 million British-born, out of which over 1 million are highly skilled university graduates, are living abroad and three quarters of these figures have settled abroad for more than 10 years now. Comparatively speaking, Britain has now now lost more than 10 percent of its highly skilled; a record skilled emigration that is only surpassed by Mexico. One Briton in every three minutes left the UK in the year 2006. People leaving Briton for abroad in the past have quoted high taxes, high living costs, relatively low salaries, low career growth opportunities, bad weather as some of the key reason for their moving abroad. Luckily for Britain, HSMP came in at the right time when the exodus was beginning to show its serious impact on the economy. Today, Britain has successfully replaced the brain drain of 1 million with an import 1 million skilled from abroad.
However, since the program was introduced, it has attracted a great deal of criticism, much of it not without merit as the Home Office has itself admitted indirectly by revising the HSMP for the year 2008 onwards by introducing fundamental changes in the previous program. Mere concentration on importing the skilled from abroad is not going to fix the problem; Britain needs to apply a multi-pronged approach in order to both lure the right skills and also to keep them in Britain. Without addressing these issues, even those coming into the UK through the skilled migration program will not stay here for long because better life will always tempt them to make a second move to a better place such as the US, Canada, Australia etc. It can be safely argued that had the system been good, those who left Britain so far would not have done so in the first place. One only leaves one's home when the prospects are not slightly brighter but much brighter abroad. Britain needs to plug that widening gap in the prospects for the skilled with its American, Australia, Canadian and Kiwi counterparts. Apart from the weather and poor climate, everything can be turned around to achieve this objective. Some of the fundamental changes that need to brought about are as follows:
1. Allow incentives to universities to attract best brains and scientists: Over 60 percent of the world's star-scientists today can be found in the US universities. The US government encourages its universities to attract and retain the outstanding brains in science and other fields of significance. However, the British universities continue to work with their primitive system in which foreign students are merely seen as source of foreign exchange (all non EU students pay three times of what the home students pay in Britain), with only a few scholarship available for the lucky ones. Britain should introduce a system where all Ph.D or doctorate students should be thoroughly screened for their capabilities and talent and then once accepted, should either be charged the same home student fee or provided hardship funds in deserving cases. New Zealand has implemented this system with great success in attracting and retaining the skills the require. British universities, well and widely known for their academic excellence, can achieve far better results through the same system than New Zealand.
2. Provide long term visa security to highly skilled migrants. Brtain remains the only country with a skilled migration program where the permanent residence in the country is not guaranteed and the visa extension can be refused any time if the skilled migrant has not been able to obtain the right kind of job matching his or her skills. No other country has such a scary system of skilled migration. How can a skilled person with a high level of income uproot himself or herself for a life in another country where even his permanent residence is not secure and where he may be forced to leave any time ? None of the successful attractors of skilled migrants including the US, Canada, Australia or New Zealand have such a flawed policy. Britain needs to fix this if it is to attract and retain skilled migrants. Without rectifying this fundamental flaw, skilled migrants will either stop entertaining the thought of coming to the UK or once they are here, they will be constantly thinking of moving to a better place with more secure future in terms of his or her resident status.
3. Create better living standards for all by lowering the tax levels by cutting, where possible, abuse of public welfare funds (including the abuse of asylum system) and of course, unnecessary misadventures of wars abroad that have cost the tax payers enormous amounts of money. If such misdaventures can land a strong and vibrant economy like the US into its worst recession since 1930s, its impact can be much harder on an already weakening economy of Britain. If Brtain has to remain strong and provide its citizens, including skilled migrants that make it their home, it must set its goals right and revamp the entire economic system in order to make it a better place for both the locals as well as the skilled migrants. Diversification of the economy to sectors other than the services, the arms manufacturing and energy is required. The British government must try to address the reasons why the skilled have left in the past and continue to do so such as high taxation, bleak career growth prospects, high cost of living specially poor and expensive housing. As mentioned above, all but the climate, can be changed and the steps must be taken now to do so before its too late for a country that is already at the top of world ranking for brain drain. No other country has known the value of human capital than Britain and it should continue with its long and well kept tradition by taking timely and appropriate measures in this regard.
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