The most illiberal policy in the Lib-Con deal is the plan for a cap on immigration. Now, we all know that as part of a coalition we have to put up with policies we dislike, the real problem with this policy is not just that we dislike it but that in the words of the IPPR, it is “unworkable” (see “The Limit to Limits: is a cap on immigration policy a viable policy for the UK?” March 2010). Here’s why:
1) A cap is a clumsy, inflexible mechanism, owing more to Soviet style central planning than to the needs of a free market economy. It will require governments to predict in advance each year what the needs of business will be, and thus what will be an acceptable limit for immigration. Inevitably, as the Soviets found, these matters are best left to the market. The question that has never really been answered is what happens if the cap is reached early – say in August or even June? Presumably, at that point all businesses will need to stop recruiting until January of the next year.
2) Limiting numbers in this way could have a damaging impact on our universities. Many universities depend heavily on fees from foreign students – if that income stream is severely reduced then there will be even greater demand to increase tuition fees for domestic students.
3) The NHS too could suffer badly. In 2008 the General Medical Council produced statistics showing that out of 243,910 registered doctors 91 000 had qualified outside of the UK and 68,886 outside of the European Economic Area.
4) As Nick pointed out repeatedly in the election campaign, most immigrants are either from the EU or asylum seekers and so could not legally be included in this cap. As such the policy would do little to bring net immigration under control in any event.
I don’t write any of this in order to undermine the coalition agreement that I believe is an excellent deal for Britain. I write this because I would like the coalition, and above all, the Conservative ministers in it, to think again about this policy. It goes against every liberal, free market principle that our two parties share.
Follow @LibDemVoice on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Shropshire zoo seeks runaway 'beloved' capybara
Fraser's West End ward surgeries later today #dundeewestend
What's next?
Firebird
Starmer making a mistake over Single Market - Davey
Reviewing the general election
John Waller
Steve Trevethan
Chris Moore
Peter Martin
Steve Comer
29 Comments
I thought they were according to the agreement going to mix it with our suggestion to consult businesses, hospitals etc regionally to determine what skills are needed on a regular basis
We should oppose it, but strangely enough, because it is unworkable we shouldn’t oppose it too strongly! We’ll just the back up of the Conservatives if we do; let Tories be Tories, it helps keep our identity distinct. There will be a General Election in May 2015 in which we can try to put the case for our own proposals better than we did in the recent hustings. Either the issue of immigration will have fallen off the public agenda by then or the unworkability of the Conservative’s proposals will have become apparent.
Yup. This and the output of Iain Duncan Smith’s Centre for Social Injustice are the two main things I think we should be – politely and insistently – campaigning against within the coalition.
I’m sure there was something in the Lib Dem manifesto about having caps on immigration anyway. The only disagreement was in how they would be applied and administered.
I think there is a need to control immigration as in some areas at least the number of Imigrants comming to Britain has put a lot of strain on the Infrastructure. An abitrary cap though is not the way to do this. A set of rules that ensure that UK, and other EU citizens get priority for jobs, with imigration only being allowed where there is a genuine need would seem to make more sense.
In the end though as as been repeatedly said, the vast majority of Foreign workers entering the UK come from the EU and will not be effected by a cap or any other restriction. As such I see this as more of a gesture made by the Tories to keep their anti-imigration members and supporters happy than anything else. If neccessary we should let the Tories have their way on this, while continuing to point of the dangers. There are more important Battles to fight.
Thanks for your various, interesting comments.
Andrea – the Tories have always said they would consult with business etc in determining the level of the cap. Even with consultation, setting an annual limit in advance will produce a very inflexible system with forecasts of demand that could go badly wrong (a bit like Soviet Russia). You can’t introduce a regional element into a cap on entry to the UK (unlike our idea of regional work visas).
Andrew Suffield – we always wanted a regional points system not a cap.
Paul – perhaps you’re right politically. If this does prove unworkable it will be a strong campaigning point in 2015 (and a way of keeping a distinct identity). That said, I just hope attempting a cap doesn’t do too much damage in the meantime!!
Good Article. We should, of course, be in Schengen.
I find the Lib Dems’ steadfast opposition to this policy to be one of their more illogical stances. It MAY not work, but you don’t even want to give it a chance.
1) A cap is a clumsy, inflexible mechanism, owing more to Soviet style central planning than to the needs of a free market economy. It will require governments to predict in advance each year what the needs of business will be, and thus what will be an acceptable limit for immigration. Inevitably, as the Soviets found, these matters are best left to the market.
Unless you care about, ya know, limiting immigration for social purposes. In which case, the market is terrible because it is prone to pulling in large numbers of immigrants.
The question that has never really been answered is what happens if the cap is reached early – say in August or even June? Presumably, at that point all businesses will need to stop recruiting until January of the next year.
Or, you could implement the cap on a monthly basis (say 60,000 a year, 5,000 a month), so businesses would only stop recruiting until the beginning of the next month. Or even a weekly basis.
2) Limiting numbers in this way could have a damaging impact on our universities. Many universities depend heavily on fees from foreign students – if that income stream is severely reduced then there will be even greater demand to increase tuition fees for domestic students.
But we want to phase out tuition fees altogether, presumably replacing them with taxpayer funding. This is therefore a non-issue.
3) The NHS too could suffer badly. In 2008 the General Medical Council produced statistics showing that out of 243,910 registered doctors 91 000 had qualified outside of the UK and 68,886 outside of the European Economic Area.
So, we already have those doctors. They immigrated already. This cap therefore won’t affect them. As for more doctors, I think the spending squeeze coming up is going to make any further NHS expansion a moot point for years to come. Maybe we could train up some more domestic doctors.
4) As Nick pointed out repeatedly in the election campaign, most immigrants are either from the EU or asylum seekers and so could not legally be included in this cap. As such the policy would do little to bring net immigration under control in any event.
This, I agree with. Except, my solution would be to renegotiate our position with the EU so they don’t control our immigration policy. The Lib Dems’ love of Brussels controlling us unnecessarily is another stance I don’t understand (especially at a time when the Lib Dems are arguing strongly *against* centralization of power).
@Chris
“We should, of course, be in Schengen.”
Absolutely, agreed one hundredfold. Pointless being part of the EU without participating in one of its greatest benefits.
“The question that has never really been answered is what happens if the cap is reached early”
Actually, I have heard this question asked of many Tory spokesmen over the years, and the answer given has always been the same: they would “revise” the cap if necessary to respond to changing economic circumstances, i.e. if there were still a need after reaching the “limit”, then the “limit” would be raised. I think Cameron said something along these lines in one of the TV debates.
Really, it isn’t a “cap” at all – it’s more of a target. But obviously they prefer to call it a “cap” because they like to sound tough on immigration.
Immigration being the only thing that people say is fantastic but they want less of.
The Immigration commitments under the `Coalition Agreement’ states there are several Liberal Democrat priorities previously stated, including the end of detention for children for immigration purposes,to beef up the Border Police with extended collaboration with international police forces including Interpol.To fight against the entry into the UK of organised criminals and to co-operate with Countries, in the removal of wanted criminals should remain an important goal.
Closer control of Human Trafficking must be targeted as there are currently children and women being bought and sold and transported into the UK each day and a closer control watch is imminently required.
The extended queueing of people waiting for their stay of asylum applications to be processed and determined has become a bemoaned problem without practical solution and requires greater scrutiny, as those people with genuine cases are being held up, without a fair decision.
The over riding Liberal principle that awaits work is that there are almost I million people living in the UK without official recognition and many forced by the current system to live by night and not during the day.Many if not most are only concerned with earning a living and would prefer to be living open and legitimately, in their lifetime, to reside in the UK.
The spirit of the `Coalition Achievement’ to be underlined and not underscored is to protect those immigrants who will enrich culture and work and strengthen the economy and many seeking a moral and work skills based existence.
@Alix
“Yup. This and the output of Iain Duncan Smith’s Centre for Social Injustice are the two main things I think we should be – politely and insistently – campaigning against within the coalition”
Excuse me? They haven’t even been published yet and you’ve made your mind up already? Umm – very Liberal.
@Andrew Wimble
“A set of rules that ensure that UK, and other EU citizens get priority for jobs, with imigration only being allowed where there is a genuine need would seem to make more sense”
i.e. something like a points system, need to limit the number – push up the point requirements, need more people – lower the points. A cap system in all but name, and used elsewhere in the world. Labour actually brought in this system of course, so it shouldn’t need any new laws etc to simply block everything except Tier 1.
“..the vast majority of Foreign workers entering the UK come from the EU and will not be effected by a cap ..”
Exactly, perhaps the fact that we now have a potential workforce in the 100’s of millions should mean that immigration from outside the EU is hardly ever required. Surely it should only ever really be required for Tier 1 and exceptionally low numbers of Tier 2 (I’m excluding Tier 4 of course, as they are here to study and shouldn’t be working anyway).
We should be able to attract the brightest and best from Europe; unfortunately of course many businesses prefer to take the non-EU route because they can get a cheaper workforce.
@ Jez
3). You are right of course, all of those doctors are already here. Plus I some how doubt that they all arrived in one year, so it’s unlikely that a cap (annual or otherwise) would have caused any big issue with bringing them in.
@Stuart Mitchell
“Immigration being the only thing that people say is fantastic but they want less of”
Perhaps what they really said was “Controlled Immigration is fantastic, but if politicians don’t get their act together we don’t want any.”?
You only need to read a history book to see that immigration can be of great benefit, however you also only need to read a history book to see that it can also cause tension (of the bad sort).
@Tim – I thought it was something that would be regularly re-assessed rather than being in advance but can’t recall where I read that
I’m not sure a cap is even remotely desirable, let alone practical. Europe is entering into a demographic crisis that puts the economic foundations of our social system at risk. We badly need immigration across the board to counteract our ageing population.
@Thomas – this doesn’t affect EU migration
Disappointing lack of reference to the fact that people are key to wealth creation. If the free flow of capital is good for wealth creation, then the free flow of labour is equally good. It’s where the wealth flows to that’s the real issue. If we taxed its appropriation rather than its production, then coping with immigration would be self-financing and automatic. It would no longer figure on electoral radars and xenophobic racism could be confined to history books.
As Jez suggests, “illiberal” has become one of the most casually overused words out there. The individuals who’d be affected by such a cap are neither British citizens nor tax-payers who are the principal (and secondary) responsibilities of the State.
Yes, doctors and other high ranking professionals may be affected, but it should be unremarkable to say that it is mainly low-paid workers. To say, “okay we’re run our domestic workforce into exhaustion with skivvy jobs so now let’s turn our eyes to an even more desperate group” doesn’t really smack of the spirit of the internationale.
I would have thought it was an elementary Liberal principle that countries have control of their own borders.
I wrote :-
“Immigration being the only thing that people say is fantastic but they want less of”
Chris_Sh replied :-
“Perhaps what they really said was “Controlled Immigration is fantastic, but if politicians don’t get their act together we don’t want any.”?”
Really I was only paraphrasing the Tory manifesto, which says :-
“Immigration has enriched our nation over the years… But immigration today is too high and needs to be reduced.”
The goal of most politicians seems to be to find some cosy compromise where we reap all the economic benefits of immigration without upsetting the xenophobes too much. I don’t think it’ll ever work. People have always moaned about immigration, whatever the numbers.
>> The goal of most politicians seems to be to find some cosy compromise where we reap all the economic benefits of immigration without upsetting the xenophobes too much.
During the 1950s, some of the strongest proponents of mass-immigration were old Tories who didn’t think Imperial subjects should be restricted from moving here if they wished.
The urban working classes haven’t been White for decades, and now one is just as likely to hear West Indian single mothers in Hackney complaining about [perceived] preferential treatment to new immigrants (such as Vietnamese taken in by the Council in return for Government grants).
If one is looking for a way to further polarize the debate and present oneself as more insightful than hoi polloi, then branding all critics – sui generis and right down to a minimum wage carer in Rochdale – as xenophobic is the way to go about it.
Perhaps I should make clear that where I used the word, “unworkable,” I really meant, “irrelevant”.
A cap on non-EU immigration will be unlikely to have any real effect on reducing levels of immigration as most comes from within the EU. It is possible that net levels of EU immigration will fall or even result in net emigration, all will depend, though, on economic considerations. The cap will have no (or little) effect on this, being nothing but a sop to the tabloids. If net levels of immigration fall to levels that cause the Daily Heil to shut up, the Tories of course will claim a victory for their policy. So be it, Tories are what they are. Of course immigration may rise, as the cap is “irrelevant,” in which case we must be prepared to argue the case for the free movement of people within the EU, which will come under pressure from UKIP and like-minded parties and individuals.
This will still not invalidate our asylum policy. We must sharpen its definition and be prepared to argue strongly for it – both in human terms and for practical reasons of increasing tax revenues and decreasing criminality – at the next election.
We must also develop policies to mitigate the ill effects of immigration, such as pressures on housing, services and salary levels in the lowest paid sectors of the economy.
This is the first time I’ve posted anything on “Liberal Democrat Voice”, so I’m pleased to have sparked such a lively and interesting debate.
Jez – thanks for taking the trouble to give such a detailed response. On tuition fees (another hot potato!) it will be much more difficult to abolish them if universities find themsleves scrapped for cash because applications from non-EU students (including many from the Commonwealth) are severely reduced.
On the NHS – you make a fair point that the stats I quote are for doctors already here. It would be more useful to know what proportion of doctors recruited each year are from outside the EU – I don’t suppose anyone has the figures to hand?
On re-negotiating our treaties with the EU in relation to freedom of movement for EU citizens – this just isn’t going to happen. This principle is well established in a number of treaties and we would need the consent of the other 26 member states to redraw these provisions. If we are serious about dramatically reducing immigration we should leave the EU so we can control our own borders. I think this would cut immigration – but at a terrible price!
@Tim Starkey
“On re-negotiating our treaties with the EU in relation to freedom of movement for EU citizens – this just isn’t going to happen. This principle is well established in a number of treaties and we would need the consent of the other 26 member states to redraw these provisions. If we are serious about dramatically reducing immigration we should leave the EU so we can control our own borders. I think this would cut immigration – but at a terrible price!”
Yes, agreed, and the majority of Britain’s people understand that. The Conservative party understands this too, but from time to time it likes to pretend that various things are possible, which of course are not possible and some of its MPs would wish to have a policy to leave the EU. Happily, only UKIP and a few fringe parties believe in such a course of economic suicide, but we should feel free to point out where Conservative rhetoric varies from its policies.
I would recommend that we should stand for participation in Schengen, as the current British position is not fully in accord with the principle of free movement of people. If immigration were to become less of a political hot potato, I am sure that the Great British elector would appreciate the idea of documentless travel within Schengenland.
@Stuart Mitchell
“Really I was only paraphrasing the Tory manifesto, which says”
In a sense, so was I. Depends on how you read it I suppose.
“The goal of most politicians seems to be to find some cosy compromise where we reap all the economic benefits of immigration without upsetting the xenophobes too much. I don’t think it’ll ever work. People have always moaned about immigration, whatever the numbers.”
It is a compromise, but I wouldn’t say it’s not to upset the xenophobes, I think it’s more not to create additional ones. The true xenophobes would be that way regardless of the controls put in; however most people are generally welcoming of others.
The problem isn’t so much immigration but more to do with change, which many people find stressful. So, for instance, if over the space of a year or 2 people see there local area filling up with immigrants then they may feel stressed and threatened. The same number of immigrants over 10 years would probably not seem as threatening as the change is gradual.
Didn’t Terry Wogan say something along the lines of “Slow and Steady wins the race” 😉
Chris, can you provide evidence those sympathetic to a cap are “xenophobes”?
@Kehaar
“Chris, can you provide evidence those sympathetic to a cap are “xenophobes”?”
Err no – but as I wasn’t saying that why would I?
Hi,
This cap is very essential to stop many people who dont deserve Tier 1 or Tier 2 but are coming here. One of my friends mother is applying for Tier 1 who is 58 yeras and it surprised me that since she qualifies the points because of her good salary, she wants to come here. I wonder how useful will she be for British economy. Also, there should be a cap on tourist visa as many Indian parents are coming here and staying here for more than 6 months or sometimes tey go back for a week and then come again. Also, there have been many many cases where they torture their daughter in laws and she is supposed to stay quite, which is a normal thing in India but its happening at a very very large scale over here. this also needs to be stopped.
you should stop on tourist visa as some of Indian parents are coming here and staying here for more than 6 months or sometimes tey go back for a week and then come again. .can u please stop giving these tourist visa for long period.
Well said Geetika, I am myself suffering and aware of hundreds of girls here who are tortured by their in laws here and cant speak, so I guess there should be a complete check on that as well and restrictions on tourist visa as the Indian parents go back after 6 months and then come back within a month. I guess tourist visa for family should not be more than 3 months. I wish the government does something about that as well.
I wish someone could do anything about stopping the tourist torture the people staying in Britian.