March 5, 2008 Indian Migrants
Challenge Britain
on Visa Rules
By Dipankar De Sarkar
London
A challenge to changes made to Britain's visa rules, mounted by
49,000 mostly Indian migrants, reached the British courts Wednesday
with the government accused of breaching race relations and human
rights acts.
The migrants are challenging retrospective changes made by the
British government to its Highly Skilled Migrants Programme (HSMP)
visas. Launched in 2002, the scheme was aimed at attracting doctors,
engineers, accountants and IT specialists to fill a skills gap in
Britain.
However, the government made retrospective changes to the visa
regulations in 2006 saying applicants had to show annual incomes of
40,000 pounds and be younger than 32 years of age in order to
qualify.
A voluntary group known as the HSMP Forum, whose 49,000 members are
mostly Indians but also include other Asians and Africans, claim
they and their families are at risk because of the retrospective
nature of the rules.
They say making the rules retrospective violates their human rights,
a view backed the British parliament's Joint Committee on Human
Rights, which has recommended that "those who had already been
granted leave as a highly skilled migrant on the HSMP when the
relevant changes took effect should be treated according to the
rules which applied before those changes".
The migrants also cite Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) findings
to claim it is harder for black and ethnic minorities (BME) to
secure highly-paid jobs in Britain, which means many of those who
are already in the country may not earn 40,000 pounds a year.
The CRE says the new rules favour European Union migrants over those
from outside the EU region.
The Forum says 90 percent of its members - around 44,000 people who
left well-paid jobs in India to settle and raise families in Britain
- may have to leave if the changes are applied retrospectively.
According to Forum Executive Director Amit Kapadia, up to 150,000
people may be at risk, when families are taken into consideration.
Chandrasekar Elangovan, executive committee member of the HSMP
Forum, said he hoped for justice from the "highly respected UK
judicial system".
"It is ironic that a government which boasts itself as champions of
human rights around the globe is actually playing with the lives of
thousands of skilled immigrants and their families by changing the
rules retrospectively," he said.
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