• Workforce
  • 3 Jun, 2024

GMB Union boss and CBI boss make strange bedfellows on immigration

"The truth is we need migrant workers in our economy." Not something you'd expect to hear from the boss of one of the UK's biggest unions, but Gary Smith is looking pragmatically at a Labour's latest proposals on migration. Both he and other business leaders across the spectrum acknowledge that we need properly targeted migrant workers to fill stubborn skills gaps where British trainees are either unwilling or geographically unable to take up positions. The meat industry is a good example of such a scenario. We need to supplement the UK workforce with overseas workers.

But, stifling the ability of the food industry to produce food domestically comes with consequences that could be more serious than, for example, stifling the influx of overseas students and their family members. If we don't have the manpower to produce our own food, we have a food security issue that leaves the country more dependent on imports and more vulnerable to supply chain shocks.

It's not just our industry that has been sounding the alarm on recent changes to immigration policy. There's a growing chorus of sectors that are warning that closing off access to overseas workers by hiking the minimum salary level required beyond what an equivalent UK worker is being paid will result in unintended consequences. Either companies could move production offshore (so British industry and workers both lose out) or companies will have to hike prices to pay for increased overheads. In our case, that will mean food inflation for British consumers. 

We need politicians to stop using immigration for political point-scoring and start taking a pragmatic, granular approach to ensure we get the skills and workers where they're needed most.

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