Civil engineering contractors today expressed serious concern over recommendations from the Migration Advisory Committee to adopt a Canada-style migration system.
The Committee’s report said that free movement of labour from the EU should end after Brexit, and that there should be no preferential access to the labour market for citizens of any other country or sector specific schemes bar agriculture.
Commenting, CECA Director of External Affairs, Marie-Claude Hemming said: “CECA is concerned that if adopted by Government, the MAC’s recommendations have the potential to slow down the development of infrastructure across the UK.
“This will impact upon the Government’s ambition to rebalance the economy, as the proposed recommendations risk a ‘brain drain’ as workers from the rest of the country are drawn to London and other industry hotspots, replacing lost migrant workers. This could devastate the delivery of local and regional projects nationwide.
“We support MAC’s recommendations around recruiting home grown talent to meet demand, but with near record low youth unemployment in the capital, options here are limited.
“CECA believes that in the long term, wider industry change including technology will address some of these recruitment challenges. But in the meantime any future migration system must be flexible enough must ensure that a shortage of workers does not block delivery of vital projects.”
< ENDS >