The newly announced High Potential Talent visa scheme is aimed at attracting the world’s top talent to our shores and by in large this will be a good thing for the UK. To be fair it seems largely similar to the pre Brexit Highly Skilled Migrant scheme. This though will though not solve the current skills crisis in retail hospitality and leisure (RHL) that has some of our top hotels not offering a full dining service, restaurants, and pubs not open seven days a week and some conference venues not taking summer bookings because of the availability of staff.
Data released last week shows the unemployment rate at 3.7% and for the first time ever, vacancies at 1.3m exceed those actively looking for work. Actively is the key word here since it seems during the pandemic over half a million, mainly older workers, have joined the great resignation and left the workforce.
The RHL sectors are largely unsupported by the education sector that does not provide the essential customer service skills these industries need. I hear a lot about apprenticeship schemes and whilst these are useful, many small businesses do not have the staff resources to allocate to an apprentice thus the issue is confounded.
What is required is a repositioning in society that working in the RHL sectors offers a great career choice and that science and technology, whilst also very important, is not for everyone. We also need to ensure that students are studying for a degree that will ensue they get well paid work. A recent Universities UK report stated there were 1million more graduate vacancies than graduates. Part of the issue here is when employers assess their hiring needs, they default to saying the need a graduate when far too often they don’t, they just need someone with the right experience.
I wish all these visa holders well, I hope they start new companies here and contribute to our economy, I also hope they can make their own coffee and cake, pull a pint, cut their own hair, cook and serve themselves in a shop since we are running out of people to do these jobs.
