Member Article

IoD insist EU migrants help UK economic growth

Following the controversy of MP Chris Bryant’s speech yesterday about EU migrant workers, the Institute of Directors have defended the state of the UK labour market.

Director general Simon Walker insists clamping down on EU migrants is not the answer to youth unemployment, aside from being illegal.

While acknowledging Mr Bryant is right to be concerned about the high levels of youth unemployment in the UK, Mr Walker argues the solution is not to clamp down on employing EU migrants.

A speech the shadow immigration minister Mr Bryant was due to deliver yesterday was leaked to the Sunday Telegraph.

In it, he was reported to be set to name and shame Tesco and Next for paying staff less than the minimum wage and preferring to employ Eastern European workers, claims the retailers deny.

The UK economy is showing signs of recovery, and Walker says discriminating against EU labour, as well as being illegal, would harm growth.

He says: “Discriminating in any way against EU migrant labour would not only be illegal and entirely contrary to all the principles of the free market, but would damage Britain’s growth prospects just as the economy is starting to take off.”

“What is needed is continuing urgent reform to Britain’s education and welfare systems in order to reverse the decline in the employability of young British workers.”

Tesco and Next reiterated yesterday that in some cases they must hire EU migrants, as British workers aren’t forthcoming for certain vacancies. Bryant described British workers as “less physically mobile”.

Walker sees this as a symptom of the welfare system. He said: “The fact that we have a welfare system with marginal deduction rates as high as 90% means that it can be entirely rational for British welfare claimants to resist entering the workforce. It often makes no financial sense for a claimant to take a low paid job.”

“The fact that international comparisons suggest British education ranks 25th for reading, 28th for maths and 16th for science, and that the UK is being overtaken by Poland and Estonia, tells its own story.”

Britain is the biggest magnet for migrants across Europe, with more than 216,000 EU citizens working in the country last year. Many of these jobs are low skilled, in places like warehouses, where Mr Bryant targeted his grievance of Tesco and Next, and fruit picking.

He was reported to have said: ““Look at Next Plc, who last year brought 500 Polish workers to work in their South Elmsall [West Yorkshire] warehouse for their summer sale and another 300 this summer.”

“They were recruited in Poland and charged £50 to find them accommodation.”

“The advantage to Next? They get to avoid agency workers regulations, which apply after a candidate has been employed for over 12 weeks, so Polish temps end up considerably cheaper than the local workforce, which includes many former Next employees.”

Next denied this, saying agency workers from Poland cost exactly the same as local agency workers.

Walker says no employer sets out to favour migrant labour, but the combination of inadequate skills and a welfare system which actively demotivates beneficiaries means it has often been migrant workers who fill the gaps.“

He added: “To their credit, Coalition ministers are implementing major reforms to our welfare and education systems, aimed at reversing the decline in the employability of our young people.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Graham Vincent .