FILE PHOTO: A man carrying a bag adorned with a British Union Jack flag steps into a bus departing from Sofia’s central bus station to London via Austria, Germany and France January 2, 2014. REUTERS/Stoyan Nenov
March 27, 2018
LONDON (Reuters) – Restricting migration into Britain will very likely lead to lower output and employment growth, an interim report commissioned by the British government said on Tuesday, warning that firms were not prepared for a tightening labor market.
“Lower migration would very likely lead to lower growth in total employment, and lower output growth,” said the report by the Migration Advisory Committee, which focused on migration from the European Economic Area.
The report was ordered by the government last year to help it design a post-Brexit immigration system, with the independent advisory body asked to assess the impact on the labor market of leaving the European Union.
The initial findings were based on evidence received from more than 400 businesses and industry bodies and the committee did not make any policy recommendations. The final report is due to be published in September.
The report also said many firms did not seem well prepared for “a changing and tighter labour market in which they may be competing with each other for labour more intensively than in the past; still fewer seemed to be making provisions for change”.
(Reporting by William James; editing by Michael Holden)
