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Managed Migration

I welcome the debate, and a great deal of what is in the White Paper. That is not always the case when I see what the Home Office proposes. We do need clarity in the system: people must be able to understand the rules, because that is good for both employers and applicants. There is no doubt that the present system is far too complex and bureaucratic. Many of us will know of people who have been given work permits and then refused entry clearance, although it must have been blatantly obvious that some of them would be refused entry clearance before they were given work permits. A huge amount of detail remains to be filled in. The White Paper is really no more than an outline, although both the Minister and the hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green) referred to some of the detail. Neither this debate nor any other debate on the subject that I have heard has dealt adequately with the extent to which a managed migration system should relate purely to economic benefits for the United Kingdom, or—a key question, in my view—with how much attention will be paid to the rights of the people who come here to work. I do not want to see a Gastarbeiter system involving people coming here and working for quite lengthy periods with no rights. That would affect not just those people but the rest of the work force, in ways that I may describe later. As for the application process, it is clearly advantageous for both applicant and employer to know what is required and to be able to carry out some self-assessment. In theory at least, that is simpler than the present arrangements. However, I should like the Minister to clarify a couple of points, one of which is about the position of sponsors in some of the tiers. Obviously the reliability of a sponsor will matter. I do not object to the suggestion that an employer or educational institution should have a duty to report when someone has disappeared, or has not even taken up an offer. I note, however, that in some cases sponsors themselves will be given either an A or a B grade. I am far from clear about how that will work, especially early in the process, before there has been much experience of the scheme. What assumptions will be involved in deciding whether a sponsor will be given an A or a B? Will there be any arrangements for sponsors to contest their assessments? It could be argued that an A or a B grade could constitute a reflection on the sponsor’s reputation. Certainly some sponsors who receive B grades may wish to contest them, for that simple reason. As others have pointed out, the system of sponsorships and grading may tend to favour the large employer who continues to import large numbers of workers, rather than the small employer who may find it harder to enter the system. Another question that has been raised concerns the liability of an employer at the end of a contract of employment. I feel that it would be unreasonable to expect a small employer, in particular, to bear any liability once the contract had ended. At the same time, there seems to be no scope for people who may have worked here for two or three years to have a holiday, or to wind up their affairs before they leave. Obvious questions have been raised about how the higher tiers will cope with people who may be highly skilled, but who may not have academic qualifications or earn large salaries. I have another concern about tier 1, however. It does not require a job offer or a sponsor; it allows someone to come in purely on the basis of qualifications and earnings—in some instances, perhaps, on the basis of qualifications alone. We must ensure that we do not strip other countries of skilled people whom they cannot afford to lose. We have had discussions of this kind in the past about the health service, but it is not only in the health service that such problems arise. What causes me most concern is tier 3, which will probably cover most low-skilled migrants. We know that some sectors, such as agriculture and hospitality, are highly dependent on unskilled labour from outside the United Kingdom. Tier 3 involves a maximum of 12 months, no rights of entry for dependants and no right to switch to another employment route. The White Paper says that that tier will be run by ““operators””. I should be interested to hear from the Minister who he thinks those operators will be.