There are often not enough suitable applicants in the UK, so many businesses look globally to hire the best talent and find themselves navigating the UK’s costly and bureaucratic immigration system.
In most cases employers must sponsor anyone who is not a British or Irish national and first have to register as a sponsor with the Home Office.
Employers must submit very specific information and evidence to show they are active and trading and, as a condition of holding a sponsor licence, they must comply with a range of onerous reporting and record keeping obligations – immigration officers may visit unannounced at any time.
It remains a challenge to find a suitable immigration route for those who are based overseas.Employers must also ensure they only sponsor individuals in roles meeting the relevant skills and salary thresholds and that the individual is filling a genuine UK vacancy. It costs thousands of pounds to sponsor a worker and employers wanting to do so urgently are often shocked to discover that it takes weeks for sponsor and overseas visa applications to be processed.
The process is particularly slow currently, with all overseas priority processing suspended while Home Office resources have been diverted to process Ukrainian visas.
Sponsorship is therefore only a realistic option for the most senior or skilled roles. Indeed, it is not possible for employers to sponsor individuals in roles that the Home Office deem to be low skilled, including many jobs in sectors such as retail, hospitality and manufacturing, where employers are facing particular recruitment difficulties.
Limited options
Many businesses hoped that the several new immigration categories announced in Spring 2022 would make it easier to recruit non-UK/Irish nationals, however this has not been the case so far.
The first new route, the Senior and Specialist Worker route, is a rebranding of the previous Intra Company route, and enables employers with the appropriate sponsor licence to transfer employees from an overseas group company to the UK office. The only real change is that the minimum salary increased to £42,400 a year.
This route is only open to those coming to the UK to undertake a senior or highly skilled UK-based role and assumes that an individual is based in the UK, working for a UK employer. In reality, as businesses adapt to post-pandemic remote working, individuals are increasingly international, often based in a different jurisdiction to their employer.
Yet, the government has not addressed this and it remains a challenge to find a suitable immigration route for those who are based overseas, wishing to come to the UK to work for a few weeks or months annually.
The Service Suppliers route is aimed at contractual service suppliers and self-employed, independent professionals who are based overseas and need to undertake an assignment in the UK to provide services. However, this scheme, like its predecessor, is limited to services covered by one of the UK’s international trade agreements.
The rules are particularly complex and depend on the trade agreement in question.Applicants must be working as or for an overseas service provider that will provide services to their UK sponsor and must have worked as or for the overseas service provider outside the UK for at least 12 months.
The UK company (to which the services are being supplied) must be willing to sponsor the individual and must have a contract with the overseas service provider, which has been registered with the Home Office, and on which the applicant, as a Service Supplier, will work.
The rules are particularly complex and depend on the trade agreement in question. As a result, it is unlikely many businesses will make use of this route.
Similarly, the new Secondment Worker route for workers being seconded to the UK as part of a high value contract or investment by their overseas employer is unlikely to be of great use.
Applicants must be working for an overseas business with a contract with their UK sponsor, which has been registered with the Home Office by the UK sponsor, and must have worked outside the UK for that overseas business for at least 12 months. Again, the UK company needs to be willing to act as the sponsor and minimum skill levels for the role must be met.
A new hope
The most promising route, the new High Potential route, opened on May 30 2022 and enables eligible non-UK/Irish nationals to come to the UK without the need for a job offer. The government’s stated aim is to “introduce an elite points-based route to attract the brightest and best to the UK to maintain our status as a leading international hub for emerging technologies”.
In reality, the route is relatively limited. To apply, the individual must have been awarded a degree from an overseas university on the Global Universities List during the five years before their immigration application.
The Global Universities List is published by the Home Office, which is compiled annually and consists of all non-UK institutions that are ranked in the top 50 of at least two of the following: Times Higher Education World University Rankings; Quacquarelli Symonds World University Rankings; and the Academic Ranking of World Universities.
There are very few routes available for low skilled roles.Applicants must meet English language and maintenance requirements and successful applicants will only be granted two or three years’ permission, depending on their degree. This route does not lead to settlement and, prior to their leave expiring, they would need to switch into another route, usually sponsorship.
The other new routes are very niche and are aimed at scale up businesses, overseas businesses looking to set up a branch in the UK and businesses looking to send graduates to the UK as part of a graduate training programme.
The latest schemes are largely rhetoric over substance and fail to address the key issues of simplifying the rules, reducing bureaucracy, costs and delays and allowing businesses to move people more seamlessly from one country to another.
There are very few routes available for low skilled roles and it is likely that for most businesses the latest immigration routes will not even begin to make up for the loss of free movement, or to assist businesses in being able to recruit the best talent on a world stage.
Kerry Garcia is partner and head of employment and immigration at law firm Stevens & Bolton
