Sitting in a popular Japanese restaurant in Soho, London, I was enjoying a bowlful of soba noodles and an old friend’s company. She is currently interning at a consultancy and is someone I consider to be intelligent, creative and social: the employers holy trinity. Unfortunately she is being expelled of the country on November 28th this year, because her Tier 4 student visa expires and the consultancy was rejected by the UK Border Agency (UKBA) as a Sponsor. She’s been left high and dry, and the consultancy she’s working for must now hire someone who they have to re-train and ensure is at least as proficient as my friend. In a relatively objective view, I doubt it will be easy replacing someone like her. However, she is not too worried, she can just return to the USA (where she comes from) and work there.

This story is just one of many: the international student who comes to the UK to study with hopes of a future in the UK, and then gets kicked out of the country unless someone is willing to sponsor them. The UKBA is not renown for its effectiveness. In the last couple of years, since its creation in 2008, it has been the centre of numerous scandals ranging from the use of excessive force during deportation to simple mismanagement. Its careless and in-effective work has even lead to its disbanding and its responsibilities being returned to the Home Office as of the 31st of March 2013. Thus, in line with the Conservative pledge to reduce the number of migrants living and working in the UK, the new revamped UKBA under the control of  the Home Office  has cancelled an entire category of visas, the Post-Study Work visa, which would allow Tier 4 visa holders to work for 2 years without sponsorship in the UK. This is just one example of how the UKBA and the Home Office are trying to cut net immigration figures. They have also massively reduced Tier 1 entrepreneur visa acceptances and become stricter on who can be a Sponsor (Universities and Companies). The economic implications of this are monumental. Sectors such as IT, pharmaceuticals, higher education and finance require highly skilled migrants as the supply in the UK is inadequate, as the research conducted by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) (5th Nov 2013) showed. The research also found that skill shortages in certain sectors in the UK was due to an unwillingness to work. By making immigration laws for skilled migrants and students more stringent, the British government is effectively reducing intellectual capital in its own country, hindering its own growth. The UK, even with its encouraging figures, is still going through a massive structural public debt crisis and is barely recovering from recession. It therefore certainly does not need a reduction in the numbers of young, productive, skilled and motivated workers available to its economy.

There are some arguments that politicians put forward as to why immigration needs to be reduced. One, which is often used, is that migrants drain the welfare system. However the media and politicians have exaggerated this drain. For example, it was claimed in the Guardian that immigrants use up to £2 billion of the NHS’s resources (the NHS’s annual budget last year was £104 bn). However, when reading the original study the figure is actually only £70 million (0.06% of budget). Another argument is that less immigrants will create more opportunities for British workers. This argument is hollow, by blocking migrants the unemployment rate will not suddenly drop and the unemployed will not magically get hired as they the lack the necessary skills. What will end up happening is a compromise on the employer’s part, leading to weak productivity and less attractive intellectual capital, affecting the overall growth of the country. The more efficient way to solve the unemployment issue is to make the British education system more competitive. Through this, British workers will obtain the desirable skills that will allow them to get jobs over foreign competition and economic productivity will be un-compromised. Advocates of the governments plans argue that wages are being driven down by immigration. However, that argument only applies to unskilled labour migrants, which form a portion of migrants, not the complete picture. In the NIESR report, it states that immigrants actually fill some labour market gaps, thus not stealing jobs from British nationals. This evidence runs contrary to the political justifications that reducing net immigration is necessary to protect British jobs and wages.

Because the United Kingdom is part of the EU, the UK cannot inhibit any influxes from the European Union. The UK has strong asylum laws as well, which are difficult to tackle due to human rights issues. Therefore, those who are targeted are migrant workers, students and entrepreneurs. Thanks to David Cameron’s promise of 100,000 net migration by 2015, the groups of people who are most likely to contribute to Britain’s economy will be the ones pushed out of Great Britain. What the UK must keep in mind is that while these entrepreneurs and students leave the UK, other firms in other developed countries will absorb them and use their productivity and skills. What the UK loses out on, the rest of the world gains, which exacerbated the UK’s lack of competitiveness even more.

Returning to my American friend’s problem, she loves London and wants to stay, but what is London’s loss will be New York’s gain. If this disturbing trend continues, the UK will lose out on diversity and outside the box thinking. As the world only becomes more competitive, the British government better understand that getting votes with the immigration card might be a great idea at this moment, but that such a policy could lead to a serious backlash when the economy becomes static in the future.