The immigration points system vote in parliament yesterday was a crushing blow for people who come to the UK to work. It is also a crushing blow for businesses that rely on them. Leisure, retail, construction, agriculture and care services will all be trying to figure out where they can source their workforce.

The government have squared that circle in the agricultural industry. Last week they voted down a bill that asked for American imported food to adhere to British standards. This means that if British farmers cannot find the labour to work on farms, we can just get cheap food from the USA or anywhere else and British food can rot.

Where are the government going to fill the gaps in the construction labour, care and leisure industries, is anyone’s guess?

Care & Covid19

Covid19, as we know, has been a complete disaster for the government in many ways. However, at least it has wrecked the economy, so that could solve the labour crisis in construction and leisure, at least in the short term. They will see this as a silver lining.

However, people will still need looking after in care homes and hospitals. By setting the £25k skills barrier, the government have blocked a lot of vital people coming into the country in future. I do not know how that can be changed unless the job title and salary of care workers is upgraded to over £25k?

A conspiracy theorist would say that by sending Covid19 patients from hospitals back into care homes right up until the 16th April, they have eased the labour situation by killing off loads of old folk. Less old folk, less requirement for care staff from abroad. ‘Jobs a goodun’ as they say. That, of course, is an inconceivable and high risk strategy, but I bet Dominic Cummings thought it was a reasonable solution.

Freedom of Movement

Perhaps by denying British people the freedom they previously had to move and work across the EU, they can force them to fill these jobs? Maybe, cleaners, care workers, auxiliary nurses and catering staff will be those who can no longer afford a £30k university education in the UK? A race to the bottom, if you will.

All the jobs over the £25k threshold could go to workers from across the globe who have come to the UK for free, with a skilled education paid by their own government. Is that what Brexit is all about? British people doing all the low paid jobs whilst there is a worldwide free for all on ‘skilled’ jobs over £25k?   

Why pay for a British graduate engineer to be trained and give him/her a £60k salary when you can get one fully trained from elsewhere on a lower salary?  That is the very real scenario this new British points system has just put in place. The would-be British engineer will have to be a care nurse instead.

The Tory Clappers

The current topic of conversation is about how the care sector has been shafted and rightly so. How galling it must be for those care workers and nursing staff from abroad watching Tory MP’s clap them every Thursday night.

Clapping them until they are no longer required, then they can fuck off back home to their own country. The hypocrisy of it all is beyond parody, but this may only be the tip of the iceberg in a shift in the UK labour market.

Still, we got our country back and if we don’t like it, we can’t fuck off to the EU as instructed by Brexiteers. We are not allowed to anymore.

So this is freedom? You’re having a laugh.