UK Immigration News

Will Hutton, a noted UK author, economist, journalist and academic, has said that the UK should 'auction residential visas to the world's super-rich'. The proceeds should be spent on building houses, training the young and unemployed and creating jobs. This would send out the message that 'immigration is beneficial'.

On Thursday, 6th March 2014, the UK's new immigration minister James Brokenshire made his debut speech as minister. His aim seems to have been to show that the Conservatives Party, of which both Mr Brokenshire and the UK's Prime Minister David Cameron are members, is the only party which should be trusted with the UK's immigration regime.

The UK's new immigration minister, James Brokenshire, has made his first speech as minister and has said that mass immigration 'puts pressure on social cohesion'. He said that it has been good news for the 'metropolitan elite' but has driven down wages for the working class.

Mr Brokenshire became minister after his predecessor, Mark Harper resigned. Mr Harper offered his resignation to the Prime Minister, David Cameron, after realising that he had been employing an illegal immigrant as his cleaner for seven years.

14% of start-up businesses in the UK were founded by immigrant entrepreneurs, according to a newly released report. The report says that there are 456,073 immigrant entrepreneurs working in the UK who have founded 464,527 businesses which employ 8.3m people.

The report calls on the government to 'fly the flag for Britain' by 'encouraging entrepreneurs from all corners of the world to settle and launch businesses in the UK'.

Open dissent has broken out in the UK's Coalition government over immigration. The UK's political system usually requires members of the government to 'toe the party line'. This means keeping personal opinions private and speaking publicly in support of government policy. However, in the last few days, ministers have launched a war of words over immigration policy.

The Indian outsourcing firm Tata Consulting says that half of the applications it makes for US visas are being declined by US immigration. As a result, Tata is employing many more workers from the USA and Canada.

Tata's global head of human resources Ajoyendra Mukherjee told the livemint.com website that the rejection rate for visa applications made by Tata rose from about 30% in 2011 to 50% in 2012 and has stayed at that level ever since. This means that Tata has started to hire more staff in the US.