6 April 2020

On 17 March, the Home Office commissioned the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) to review the Shortage Occupation List to adapt it to the new immigration system, to be launched in January 2021. As the MAC has previously pointed out and the Home Office acknowledged in its letter, under the new immigration system the Shortage Occupation List (SOL) loses much of its purpose, and the timing of the report hinders the ability of the MAC to adequately determine  which occupations will be shortage occupations in 2021.

Under the current immigration system, migrant workers must generally have the minimum skill level RQF 6 (equivalent to a bachelor’s degree), whereas under the new system migrant workers will only need to have skill level RQF 3 (equivalent to A-Levels). For this reason, the MAC had previously only reported on occupations of RQF level 6 or above that ought to be added to the SOL. The MAC will now investigate which occupations with RQF level 3-5 face labour shortages and should be added to the list. The MAC will also review which other occupations of skill level RQF 6 will be added or removed. It will publish its report in September 2020, to allow the Home Office to take over its recommendation by the time it plans to launch the new immigration system, in January 2021.

Other measures of the new immigration system have mostly defeated the purpose of the SOL. The main advantages of adding roles to the SOL were that they do not count towards the cap on skilled workers, no Resident Labour Market Test must be conducted, and slightly lower visa fees and minimum salary thresholds apply.

However, under the new system, the cap on skilled workers is abolished, as is the Resident Labour Market Test. The MAC has also consistently advised against allowing a lower salary threshold for shortage occupations, because it perpetuates their status as shortage occupations as employers are no longer obliged to offer higher wages to make the occupations more attractive. Yet, this is precisely how the Home Office justifies maintaining the SOL in its letter to the MAC: to grant migrants undertaking professions on the SOL extra points under the new points-based system to compensate for their salaries being under the minimum threshold. The advantage of maintaining the SOL and updating it is thus questionable, to say the least.

The timing of the commission also raises questions about the MAC’s ability to predict which jobs will be shortage occupations in 2021. In its January report on the new points-based system, the MAC has already stated:

“We do not see a robust way to accurately and objectively predict future skills shortages. As such, we do not recommend a SOL review for these jobs at this time: any assessment of current shortages is unlikely to be indicative of shortages when the new immigration system is in place and once free movement has ended.”

Not only is it difficult to predict where shortages will arise before freedom of movement has ended for Europeans, the COVID-19 crisis adds to the difficulty. With the scope of the economic crisis resulting from this global health crisis being far from clear, the labour market’s landscape may look entirely different by the time the new immigration system will come into force.