£30K salary requirement post FOM

[silvercuckoo]

May I ask you if you see a social / ethical problem with a £30K salary cut-off point being introduced for new immigrants?
I am quite surprised about all the articles / opinion pieces about how it is discriminatory, draconian and will ruin lives and families.
It may or may not be a good decision economically, but I cannot understand the personal distress arguments? Maybe I am missing something?

I know of a UK postgraduate student who married a fellow non UK postgraduate student. Both worked but their incomes fell below the income threshold so they had to move to Ireland ( he holds dual citizenship), endure a six month separation while they applied for her to be able to live in Ireland and they had to leave their studies.

Teachers and nurses often warn less than 30k and a country we need to recruite them from abroad because we treat them so poorly we don’t have enough people willing to do it in the UK.

Because many key highly qualified jobs pay less than £30k - nursing, academic, researcher...

Who do we think will do these roles??

I think it's quite common for people not to see the myriad of problems on paper but when you know people who are going through the process, then you see the distress it causes.

Doctors start on 26k.

30k seems pretty high, especially considering most public sector jobs (firefighter, police, doctor, nhs, teacher) have starting salaries up to 10k less than that. As though the government is suggesting that below 30k is a bad salary, but not for its own workers.

When they brought the £35k rule in for non-EU migrants in, I lost an excellent member of my team because I couldn’t convince my company to give her a pay rise to let her stay. She’d been to uni here and had worked constantly since graduating, bought a house and got married. £30k is even worse - we could lose a third of our junior staff!

When this kind of rule was brought in for non-EU immigrants, there were loads of stories about how awful it was.

For non-EU spouses, the British spouse has to earn over a certain amount in order for them to live in the UK. There was a horrible story a few years ago about a British woman's Japanese husband being deported, and her having to give birth without him, because she didn't earn enough. He was a high earner, and she had had a big inheritance, I think - but it wasn't enough.

I know non-EU migrants who've been made redundant after 5 or 10 years and had to leave their partner to move back to a country where they no longer know anyone - no family etc.

Any rules on earnings is very very likely to cause issues like this.

topofthehills that's what happened to the postgraduate at my research institute. They were under immense stress and are such a lovely couple.

This policy has nothing to do with wellbeing and everything to do with getting trade deals from other countries in the future, personally I think it's awful.

1. The cap on "skilled" workers earning £30k from non-EU countries has actually been lifted in line with those who would come from the EU. This means that competition for the higher paying jobs could increase significantly, putting downward pressure on wages and availability of positions for U.K. applicants. Great for businesses as it lowers the cost for them and gives them access to wider talent pools, also means that countries which we want to do trade deals with in the future can send more people which they want to do, not so good news for British workers and graduates and hardly fulfilling Brexit promises

2. Putting the cap at 30k will not only force a lot of people in important but low paid jobs out of the country, but it will stop others coming. Who wants to uproot their life for 12 months just for the privilege of being a nurse or carer here? And surely most of these jobs benefit from experienced workers who understand the system and can offer continuity?

Combined with reduction in working age benefits this simply means that British workers will be forced into "low skilled" jobs which many don't want to do whilst the higher skilled positions are available for anyone who wants them.

Well done Brexit, well done. Just what we wanted.

Topofthehills there was a similar issue in our area with a consultant pediatrician who wife with young children was a SAHM. We have empty posts for paediatrician in the UK and they work very long hours - on the ward at 8 in the morning and they may still be there at 2 in the morning - you can understand why they want one person to be a SAHP. Obviously he was not doing to separated from his family so he moved to another country.

It’s going to make us less competitive, harm the 3conomy and leave us with key posts unfilled and unfillable. It’s turning us inward when we should be look8ng outwards.

Also who is going to do the lower skilled jobs?

@FestiveForestieraNoel
It is strange, because there is no income requirement for students in the UK, and there is no way her visa should have been be impacted by this. Unless she stopped her studies first and switched to a spouse visa. Ireland has a higher income requirement for Non-EU immigrants, by the way.
I am an immigrant myself, also subject to the Tier 2 min salary rule, but wouldn't it be strange for me to complain about it being discriminatory or unfair, given that I knew about it, accepted the rules and voluntarily moved to the UK?
I found the "I would be slashed" twitter campaign also a bit insincere, as it implied that settled people's lives would suddenly become disrupted due to some hostile action. The rule applies only to new job permit applicants from 2022, I just cannot see how this rule can be discriminatory against someone who is only planning to move in four years' time.
I accept the economic argument, but it looks like all debates around immigration are fought and won (or lost) with emotions, rather than stats.

The problem is that under a certain threshold as a country we pay out more in services (nhs, education) than we take in taxes, that's the theory, I'm assuming that tax credits etc are not allowed anyway. As a country we need to decide if we wish to subsidise the workers to come to the country basically - for skilledmedical staff and teachers working in the public sector it's an easier choice but should general taxation subsidise the wages of unskilled fruit & veg pickers or should wages rise to a level which attracts legal residents to do the work (and the purchasers of the products thus pay)?

Everyday 10-15 coaches leave the city centre for the fields, in the 8 years my friend has done the job she can count the number of British born on her fingers who sign up for work despite reasonably high employment here among young adults - it's far too hard work for most Brits. They pay £8.20 an hour and the bus is free so why do people prefer unemployment benefits (not everyone can do picking work but plenty can)

Putting the cap at 30k will not only force a lot of people in important but low paid jobs out of the country, but it will stop others coming.
But it does not apply to people already here. I agree with your point that an experienced nurse won't come in the future for a 12 month gig - there are many more attractive options worldwide - but existing nurses won't be forced out.

As it is, my local hospital lost its maternity unit because they couldn’t staff it. Expect to see issues like this magnified x100.

So can we expect an influx of people before then?

silvercuckoo
She had finished her studies, having done undergrad and postgraduate in the UK. He was nearly finished his PhD. All I know is the their income in the UK wasn't high enough.

silvercuckoo There absolutely is a wealth requirement for Tier 4 student visas - you have to show that you have the whole cost of the course and can "support yourself". This usually means having to prove that you have quite a considerable sum sitting in a bank account, though the rules vary in different circumstances.

I think you are not seeing the whole picture saying it only applies to new people. (a) It will massively discourage people and (b) what happens if people lose their job, or come to the end of a contract?

I work in a university, and there are a lot of specialised jobs on 1-5 year contracts. Many pay less than £30k. Many are currently held by EU staff. If they leave at the end of their contracts, we'll have a big issue.

There absolutely is a wealth requirement for Tier 4 student visas - you have to show that you have the whole cost of the course and can "support yourself".
This is true, but it is applied once at the time of visa issuance. Had she failed that, she wouldn't have been a student in the first place. There is no ongoing income requirement - actually, the opposite is true, the right to work on student visas is severely restricted.
I think the most likely explanation is that they moved to Ireland to use a loop hole known as "Surinder Singh", to save on the British spousal / post-study visa fees (several thousand) compared to an EEA spouse permit (£60, I think). Which still is a financial argument. Because otherwise it does not make sense.

(b) what happens if people lose their job, or come to the end of a contract?
Everyone living in the UK at the end of the Withdrawal period (in case of deal) or transition period (in case of no deal) will have rights to a settled status and therefore not subject to these requirements. The white paper is quite clear on this.

I think they ran out of runway so to speak and had to reapply in another country in order to stay together.

I wish them well.

But @anniehm if these low paying jobs need doing, they need doing. They will still be 'subsidised' even if a Brit does them. What difference does it make?

Also, I disagree that a person who comes from abroad to work in a farm will not be a net contributor to the uk: their education will have been paid for by their country of origin and unless they have children in school in the uk and have medical conditions which they most likely don't, their earning 30k minimum before they are considered good value doesn't apply.

Of course the whole idea of saying that people are only of any use to society if they earn more than £30k is also a bit dangerous, in that to some politicians, that is precisely why the poor don't deserve investment in their free health service and education. The rich will have their private alternative education and healthcare, and as far as they are concerned the rest can make do with shit services, since after all they're not working hard enough. So be careful what you wish for.

As for tax credits, they are just a form of tax distribution, and are only in the form of a payout so that higher paid people don't get this tax cut as well. Unlike a rise in personal tax free allowance, which they also do benefit from. And they are not going to stop. I don't think you would get them, as a single person picking fruit, would you?

Some jobs suit some people more than others at different point in their lives too. For a young immigrant, picking fruits abroad is an experience as well as a job, whereas for a Brit it might be more thoroughly painful. It's not like it has much potential for advancement either.

These jobs are not the kind that are going to be suitable fir someone in a formerly industrial area who wants to regain their dignity, if that is what the problem has been all along. (I'm not saying it has.)

Why are we hell-bent on having British people do low-skilled work that they don't want to do, and rejoicing that there will be more competition for better jobs?

I don't personally mind, but it doesn't seem logical to me.
It's just a measure to lower overall numbers, really.
Because wages are not going to rise, IMO. We as a society prove everyday that we don't value expensive, ethical products, and are not prepared to pay more for anything if we can help it.

If the rule is not retrospective (seems it isn't, but are we sure?) then I agree the personal distress stories are only those of couples who can't bring their other half over. Which is still cruel and ridiculous.

But this kind of immigrant scheme doesn’t do anything to reduce immigration. It also puts downward pressure on jobs that are higher paid. A good example would be the computer industries (IT, software, data science etc). A junior software will even quite a bit above £30k. I know new graduate data scientists are at over £40k. However India has a lot of supply of these. The effect is to bring the wages down for these higher skilled jobs where India and China has a lot of supply.

Australia run this type of migration scheme and many many people will score enough points and be able to move here.

And I agree it’s conflating higher earning jobs and contribution to society.