Leslie Dunton-Downer has spent much of her career asking a deceptively simple question. How do ideas travel across time, languages, borders, and political systems?
In seeking to answer this question, Leslie’s writing traces the long arc of human communication. That’s why FIRE is pleased to welcome Leslie to our Advisory Council, where her work as a writer, producer, and scholar will bring a rich, interdisciplinary perspective to the fight for free expression.
Her books on Shakespeare, opera, and the history of English explore how language evolves from shared cultural inheritance into a global force. In The English Is Coming!: How One Language Is Sweeping the World, she follows English from its Proto-Indo-European roots to its modern role as a global lingua franca, examining what’s gained, and lost, when a language dominates worldwide conversation.
Across disciplines and formats, Leslie’s career circles core concerns over who gets to speak, who gets to listen, and what forces shape that exchange.
As an opera librettist, Leslie’s work has premiered internationally, from Ligeia in Evian under the baton of Mstislav Rostropovich to projects in Paris, Berlin, Aspen, and Santa Fe. She has also produced albums of sacred and secular music from Tajikistan’s Gorno-Badakhshan region for the French label Buda Musique, helping preserve and share cultural traditions far outside the Western mainstream.
When Edward Snowden’s disclosures exposed the scale of modern surveillance, Leslie responded not with a white paper, but with a public conversation. Working with transmediale and NK Projekt, she co-produced The Magical Secrecy Tour, a bus tour through Berlin that invited passengers to explore and debate the city’s many cultures of surveillance — showcasing her creative range as well as her commitment to public discourse on privacy and free expression, issues that are central to FIRE’s work.
Leslie’s academic credentials are no less impressive. She studied Ancient Greek and oral literature for her undergraduate degree and went on to complete a PhD in comparative literature at Harvard University, where she was also a lecturer and fellow. She has served on the boards of educational nonprofits in both the United States and the European Union, and was a Daimler Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, reflecting a long-standing commitment to public education and intellectual exchange.
Across disciplines and formats, Leslie’s career circles core concerns over who gets to speak, who gets to listen, and what forces shape that exchange. Those questions sit squarely at the heart of FIRE’s mission, and we look forward to her contributions as we continue to defend and expand the space for open debate and creative expression in an increasingly surveilled and polarized world.
The committee that advises on national vaccine policy today overturned a decades-long recommendation that newborns be immunized for hepatitis B, a policy credited with nearly eliminating the highly contagious and dangerous virus in infants.
The decision came in an 8-3 vote from the committee that has been handpicked by Health and Human Service Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a long-time vaccine skeptic. It followed three previous failed attempts to vote on the measure and two days of contentious, confused hearings that further undermined the group’s credibility.
Amy Middleman, a longtime committee liaison and a University of Oklahoma pediatrics professor, said it was the first time the committee “is voting on a policy that, based on all of the available and credible evidence … actually puts children in this country at higher risk — rather than lower risk — of disease and death.”
Susan J. Kressly, the president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, which is continuing to recommend the hepatitis B vaccine at birth, called the committee’s guidance “irresponsible and purposely misleading” and said that it will bring about more infections in infants and children.
“This is the result of a deliberate strategy to sow fear and distrust among families” she said.
The members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, known as ACIP, who voted in favor of the new guidance said the universal birth dose, first introduced in 1991, had likely played a small role in the reduction of acute cases and noted that the country’s policy was an outlier when compared to those of peer nations, which have more targeted approaches. They also raised concerns about the safety of the vaccine, arguing there were insufficient trials done, a claim that has been widely debunked.
The committee’s new recommendations still include a dose of the vaccine within the first 24 hours of life for infants born to hepatitis B-positive mothers. But for those born to mothers testing negative, they recommend “individual-based decision-making, in consultation with a health care provider” to decide “when or if” to give the vaccine.
Removing the universal birth dose “has a great potential to cause harm,” dissenting committee member Joseph Hibbeln said, “and I simply hope that the committee will accept its responsibility when this harm is caused.”
The committee also voted to upend the rest of the schedule for the hepatitis B vaccine, which is required for school attendance in the vast majority of states and historically included three doses in an infant’s first year. Now, after the first dose, parents will be encouraged to ask their doctors to check infants for a sufficient immune response before proceeding with any future doses, a practice that currently lacks any scientific evidence, according to vaccine experts.
The recommendation now heads to Jim O’Neill, the acting head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, newly installed after September’s ousting of the previously confirmed director, who said she resisted Kennedy Jr.’s demands to pre-approve vaccine recommendations and fire career scientists.
O’Neill’s decision could impact not only the vaccine’s availability, but also its accessibility, since both public and private health insurers look to these policies to determine coverage.
“The American people have benefited from the committee’s well-informed, rigorous discussion about the appropriateness of a vaccination in the first few hours of life,” O’Neill said in a statement Friday.
Rochelle Walensky is the former CDC director and is now a Harvard University medical professor. (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health)
Former CDC director Rochelle Walensky, now a Harvard University medical professor who recently co-authored a paper on the importance of the hepatitis B birth dose, projected that eliminating it for infants whose mothers test negative will raise the number of newborn hepatitis B cases by 8% each year.
“We rely on an infrastructure of vaccines not only to protect ourselves and our children, but to protect our communities and one another,” Walensky said. “Today’s meeting was just another one of those chisels in the infrastructure.”
Paul Offit, the director of the Vaccine Education Center and an attending physician in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, referred to the committee as “a clown show” in an interview on CNN Friday morning.
“Honestly, it’s a parody of what this committee used to be,” he said. “It’s hard to watch, and for those of us who care about children, it’s especially hard to watch.”
Offit said he doubted that the committee understood how hepatitis B was transmitted in young children — half the time through the mother during childbirth but just as often through casual contact with someone who was chronically infected and didn’t know it. About 50% of the millions of Americans infected with hepatitis B are unaware of it.
“By loosening the [immunization] reins, you are just putting children in harm’s way,” Offit said.
The hepatitis B vaccine was first recommended by ACIP in 1982. Before that point, an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 people, including about 20,000 children, were infected with the highly contagious virus each year.
This was particularly dangerous for infants who have a 90% chance of developing liver cancer or chronic liver disease, if they contract the virus. For 4- and 5-year-olds, that chance remains high at 30-40%.
Committee members argued the guidance change reflected a return to pre-1990s policies that focused on a targeted approach, rather than a universal one. A number of them said that these earlier practices were successful and sufficient in cutting hepatitis B rates, a claim other experts — including those at the CDC — refuted.
In a departure from typical practices, presentations on disease rates and safety concerns at the hearing were not given by CDC subject-matter experts, but instead were led by a climate researcher and a known anti-vaccine activist, who authored a since-retracted paper on the impact of rising autism rates.
Amy Middleman, a pediatrics professor at the University of Oklahoma. (University of Oklahoma)
When one CDC hepatitis B expert was invited to weigh in during a question-and-answer period, he expressed concern about the presented research and emphasized the lack of evidence to support the committee’s changes. Middleman jumped in at one point to correct the committee when it misinterpreted “the conclusions of my own study.”
Throughout the meeting, Kennedy Jr.’s appointees spoke about the importance of protecting parents’ rights, seemingly pitting this against public health policy.
“My personal bias is to err on the side of enabling individual decision making and individual rights over the right [of] the collective,” said Robert Malone, the committee’s vice chair who led the meeting since newly appointed chair Kirk Milhoan, a cardiologist and critic of the COVID vaccine for children, was unavailable to attend in person.
Earlier this year, the committee also voted to change policies surrounding the measles, mumps, rubella and varicella (chickenpox) combination vaccine and this year’s COVID 19 booster.
Historically, committee members were highly qualified medical professionals, vetted for months to years before serving. But, in an unprecedented upheaval in June, Kennedy Jr. fired all 17 existing advisory members via a Wall Street Journal op-ed — after promising he would leave the committee’s recommendations intact — and hastily replaced them.
Many of the new members have espoused anti-vaccine rhetoric and other scientific misinformation and a number of them do not have medical degrees or significant experience in the field.
Cody Meissner, a professor at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine and the only committee member to have previously served, also opposed the guidance change.
Cody Meissner is a professor at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine. (Dartmouth College)
“We’ve heard ‘do no harm’ is a moral imperative,” he said. “We are doing harm by changing this wording, and I vote no.”
The committee vote was the latest in a wave of policy changes, firings and general chaos at the CDC and HHS that have alarmed experts since Kennedy Jr. took charge almost a year ago.
Last week, the Food and Drug Administration’s chief medical and scientific officer released an unsupported memo claiming COVID-19 vaccinations had contributed to the deaths of at least 10 children. Last month, Kennedy Jr. ordered CDC staff to change information on their website to promote a link between vaccines and autism, a widely discredited theory that he has promoted for years.
According to Offit, the negative impacts are already being seen: This year tallied the greatest number of measles cases (1,828) since it was declared eliminated in 2000, the majority of which were in unvaccinated children, two of whom died. It marked the first pediatric measles deaths since 2003.
There have also been nearly 300 childhood flu deaths — among predominantly unvaccinated kids — the most seen since the country’s last flu pandemic and whooping cough cases are surging in some states. The highly contagious respiratory infection, prevented through the DTaP vaccine, has killed three unvaccinated infants in Kentucky.
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What are the limits of presidential power? How many
days has it been since President Trump’s TikTok ban moratorium went
into place? What is the state of the conservative legal movement?
And where did former FIRE president David French
go on his first date?
French and Sarah Isgur
of the popular legal podcast “Advisory
Opinions” join the show to answer these questions and
discuss the few free speech issues where they disagree with
FIRE.
Timestamps:
00:00 Intro
02:18 Origin story of “Advisory Opinions”
08:15 Disagreements between FIRE and AO
15:04 Why FIRE doesn’t editorialize on the content of
speech
24:27 Limits of presidential power
43:30 Free speech, the dread of tyrants
51:01 The prosecution of political figures
58:01 Cracker Barrel
01:00:09 State of the conservative legal movement
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SAN DIEGO, CA — Community members will gather at the San Diego Civic Center Plaza for
a “Hands Off!” march on April 5 to protest DOGE and the Trump
administration’s attack on programs and services used by San Diego
residents. The local march will coincide with a nationwide day of
demonstrations expected to be attended by hundreds of thousands…
Organizers
describe the event as a collective response to policies impacting our
community. “San Diegans who are veterans, who are postal workers and
teachers, who rely on Social Security, Medicaid or Medicare, and who are
horrified at the Trump-Musk billionaire takeover of our government are
coming together to protest the Trump Administration’s attacks on the
rights and services they depend upon, many of them for survival” said
Angela Benson, a member of the organizing coalition.
Event Details:
What:
Over 10,000 San Diegans expected to peacefully demand “HANDS OFF!”
their rights and services in one of over 1,000 HANDS OFF! events
scheduled nationwide on April 5
Who: Coalition of San Diego Pro-Democracy Groups
When: Saturday, April 5, noon, 1 mile march to leave approximately 12:15 PM
Where: March starts at Civic Center Plaza Fountain by 1200 Third St., ends at Hall of Justice at 330 W Broadway
Transportation: Participants are encouraged to take public transit to the event
Planning group:
Change Begins With ME
CBFD Indivisible
Indivisible49
Indivisible North San Diego County
Democratic Club of Carlsbad and Oceanside
Encinitas and North Coast Democratic Club
SanDiego350
Swing Left/Take Action San Diego
Activist San Diego
50501 San Diego
Media Opportunities:
The following representatives will be available day-of the march for interviews.
If interested, please coordinate with Richard (770-653-6138) prior to
the event, and plan to arrive at the location marked below by 11:30 AM
Pacific
Representatives
Sara Jacobs – House of Representatives, CA-51 district
Scott Peters – House of Representatives, CA-50 district
Chris Ward – California State Assemblymember, 78 district
Stephen Whitburn – San Diego Councilmember
Reverend Madison Shockley II – Pilgrim United Church of Christ
Yusef Miller – Executive Director of North County Equity & Justice Coalition
Brigette Browning – Executive Secretary San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council and President, Unite Here!
Crystal Irving – President, Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Addressing the audience at the British Council’s East Asia Education Week 2025, held in Hong Kong, Xiang Weng, visa outreach officer for South China/ West China/ Hong Kong and Macau Visa, British Consulate – General Guangzhou, described a “new concept” which would see agent advisory groups set up to enhance collaboration.
“One of our colleagues from Vietnam set up what we call our Agent Advisory Groups and tested the concept there. Now, we plan to expand it across the rest of East Asia,” said Weng.
“By having these advisory groups, UKVI can build a much stronger connection with agents, gain valuable local intelligence, and share insights with our Home Office colleagues. This will help us introduce and improve our visa services across the region.”
Though UKVI didn’t confirm plans to introduce agent advisory groups in the broader East Asian region to The PIE News, it noted that it continually works with overseas stakeholders, including the British Council, to support prospective students by addressing their questions about the UK visa system.
Over the years, Vietnam has played a pioneering role in the UK’s efforts to increase transparency among agents in East Asia.
By having these advisory groups, the UKVI can build a much stronger connection with agents, gain valuable local intelligence, and share insights with our Home Office colleagues.
Xiang Weng, British Consulate-General Guangzhou
Just last year, over 130 education advisers in Vietnam earned the prestigious “I am a UK-certified counsellor” badge, as part of the Agent Quality Framework, showcasing their expertise and deep understanding of the UK as a study destination.
According to Weng, the concept’s success in Vietnam can be emulated in the broader East Asian region.
Though visa approval remains high in East Asia, students still fall victims to common mistakes, she explained.
“Some students forget to provide a TB (tuberculosis) certificate or evidence of finances which can impact their applications,” stated Weng.
“In countries like Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, China, and Hong Kong, when applying for a student visa, you only need to submit your passport and TB certificate. That’s it. You don’t even need to apply for IELTS or provide evidence of finances.”
Though visas challenges have not proved to be a major barrier for UK universities accessing the East Asian student market, intra-regional mobility and price concerns are leading to fluctuations in demand for UK education, as reported by The PIE News.
According to Daniel Zheng, managing director, HOPE International Education, safety concerns and career prospects have also become key factors influencing student choices in East Asia, particularly in China.
To tackle these challenges, UK universities are increasingly turning to in-house employability services and other affordability options for international students.
“In terms of affordability, many UK universities, including ours, have in-house employability service teams. Their role is to enhance students’ employability and expand their career opportunities after graduation,” stated Scarlett Peng-Zang, East Asia regional head, University of Nottingham.
“So I believe that there’s something everyone is working on regarding addressing the economic uncertainty. I found lots of UK universities offer alternative payment options to improve affordability. So is the same for Nottingham University.”
As rankings of East Asian universities rise and the countries set mammoth targets for international students, agencies are also looking inward for recruitment opportunities, expanding beyond the UK.
“In the past six months, my colleagues and I have traveled to Singapore and Malaysia three times, visiting UK university campuses like Southampton and Nottingham, as well as boarding schools like Epsom College,” stated Zheng.
“This indicates that there is significant interest – not just from us, but also from our partners and institutions – in the Malaysian market, particularly from China.”
These changing trends come at a time when UK institutions are under pressure to measure the return on investment of their agents, according to Fraser Deas, director, client success, Grok Global.
“We are noticing that UK institutions are under pressure to measure the ROI of their agents. How can we work with them, along with in-country staff, to ensure that agencies provide evidence that these partnerships are going well? There’s important work to be done in that sense,” stated Deas.
“I think there is a genuinely good understanding in the sector of the difference between in-country staff and agents. The role of a third party should be to facilitate that relationship without interfering, but it remains very important.”
Agents and universities having a direct relationship has also become important for UK-East Asia relations, with organisations like BUILA demonstrating how agents can be compliant with the UK National Code of Ethical Practice as the Agent Quality Framework comes in focus.
As per Dave Few, Associate Director, Jackstudy Abroad, while education agents are already performing well, there is a concern about maintaining quality as more agencies enter the market, particularly through aggregators.
“In my unbiased perspective, I think agents are already doing a fantastic job. The key factor is the quality of information – ensuring that as the barrier for entry for new agencies lowers through aggregators, the quality remains consistent,” stated Few.
“Whether that means requiring a year of training from the very beginning or another measure, the priority should always be keeping the student at the heart of the conversation, not revenue.”
When former Representative Justin Amash announced that he would not be seeking reelection to the House of Representatives in 2020, a lot of people wondered what he was going to do next. Voters in western Michigan first elected him to the House in 2010, and Amash won reelection four times. In office, he developed a reputation as a principled independent who wasn’t afraid of calling out members in his own party — including the president — when he thought their actions threatened Americans’ civil liberties.
Since leaving Congress, Amash has remained an outspoken advocate for the individual freedoms protected under the Constitution, especially free speech.
“The value of free speech comes from encountering views that are unorthodox, uncommon, or unaccepted. Humans learn and grow by engaging with ideas that challenge conventional thinking,” he wrote on Twitter back in 2022. “Free speech is a barren concept if people are limited to expressing views already widely held.”
FIRE is excited to announce that Amash has joined our Advisory Council, where his expertise in constitutional law and federal policymaking will support FIRE’s mission to defend and sustain the individual rights of all Americans to free speech and free thought — the most essential qualities of liberty.
Amash remains politically active and is a vocal opponent of all efforts — from both the left and the right — to undermine constitutional protections and individual liberty.
Amash was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has spent most of his life there. His father, a Palestinian refugee, and his mother, a Syrian immigrant, inspired his dedication to the cause of liberty.
“When I was a child, they spoke often about the value of freedom and how blessed we were to live in America,” says Amash.
A graduate of the University of Michigan, with a bachelor’s degree in 2002 and juris doctor in 2005, Amash practiced law until his election to the Michigan House of Representatives in 2008, where he served one term before being elected to Congress in 2010, where he served until 2021.
While in office, much of Amash’s work focused on civil liberties issues and protecting constitutionally secured rights. He was the chairman of the House Liberty Caucus — a nonpartisan congressional caucus supporting limited, constitutional government — and he was a member of the Second Amendment Caucus and co-chair of the Fourth Amendment Advisory Committee. His sponsored legislation included bills to rein in warrantless government surveillance, eliminate civil asset forfeiture, and end qualified immunity for government officials who violate constitutional rights. Since leaving office, Amash has also called for repealing the Espionage Act, which the federal government has used to punish protected free speech for more than 200 years.
Amash was known for explaining his votes online as part of a commitment to government transparency and accountability. Amash remains politically active and is a vocal opponent of all efforts — from both the left and the right — to undermine constitutional protections and individual liberty. His commentary can be found on X and Substack, and his words have recently appeared in Reason Magazine, The Free Press, and other outlets.
National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity
FR Document: 2025-01459 Citation: 90 FR 7677 PDF Pages 7677-7679 (3 pages) Permalink Abstract: This notice sets forth the agenda, time, and instructions to access or participate in the February 19-20, 2025 meeting of NACIQI, and provides information to members of the public regarding the meeting, including requesting to make written or oral comments. Committee members will meet in-person while accrediting agency representatives and public attendees will participate virtually.
The Migration Advisory Committee’s annual report for 2023 ended up being one of the publications with most policy influence on the subsequent year.
Though it was released the week after then Home Secretary James Cleverly announced a review of the Graduate route, it clearly reflected ongoing Whitehall discussions and concerns over the post-study work visa, and much of its conclusions ended up being quoted incessantly through the subsequent debate around the MAC review – especially by those in favour of the route’s abolition or restriction:
The graduate route may not be attracting the global talent anticipated, with many students likely entering low-wage roles.
Our concern that the graduate visa would incentivise demand for short Master’s degrees based on the temporary right to work in the UK, rather than primarily on the value of qualification, may well be borne out in the trends that we have observed.
As we have already shown, the rise in student numbers is almost entirely focused on taught Master’s degrees, and the growth has been fastest in less selective and lower cost universities. The rise in the share of dependants is also consistent with this.
Given all that, it’s probably a relief to all concerned that the 2024 edition of the MAC annual report doesn’t go in depth on any international student-related issue, reflecting what feels like a (welcome) period of stasis in visa policy affecting higher education under the new government.
Nevertheless, the MAC has a beefed up role under Labour – additional civil servant resource, plus we now learn that chair Brian Bell’s role will move from two to five days a week – and this time around the questions percolating away are worthy of some long-term thinking, even if they are not going to lead to knee-jerk policy decisions.
Staying or going
The annual review kicks off with consideration of long-term net migration trends, noting that the general election saw all main parties commit to bringing headline figures down.
Thinking ahead, it notes:
In the long run, work routes will have a greater impact on net migration compared to study routes as a greater percentage of those on the work route stay in the UK, whilst students are more likely to emigrate when they finish their course. Put simply, whilst students increase net migration in the year they arrive, they will reduce it by the same amount if and when they leave.
This is a helpful soundbite for the sector, after last month’s ONS figures started to make clear what has been evident for a while – that historic claims around the “vast majority” of international students leaving the UK after completing their courses no longer hold much water. The ONS net migration stats estimated that the proportion of those on student visas who had transitioned to another visa three years after arriving was 48 per cent for those who arrived in year ending June 2021. This was up from nine per cent for those who arrived in June 2019, largely driven by introduction of the Graduate route.
But the detail is still uncertain, as the MAC goes on to acknowledge. It cites recent Migration Observatory modelling (director Madeleine Sumption is now the MAC deputy chair) which estimates that the “stay rate” after eight years is around 26 per cent for those on study visas, compared to 56 per cent for those on work visas. The consequence of this is that – again, according to the Migration Observatory’s heavily caveated modelling – is that student visas contribute to 19 per cent of long-term net migration.
(The modelling also lets you adjust the assumptions around stay rate and annual international student numbers – the baseline is rather simplistically 250,000 new student visas every year from 2024 to 2032, though to be fair recent volatility means that putting a firm prediction on international recruitment is a brave bet in itself.)
All in all the MAC notes that stay rates are “highly uncertain” – but it’s an issue that will continue to inform the wider political debate, especially as the post-pandemic bulge is gradually smoothed out of net numbers. It’s notable in this context that think tank Labour Together – which typically has the ear of the government – has just put out a proposal for a “national migration plan” based on nationally set targets for different routes. Student visas, it says, would only be included in the analysis “to the extent that they have an impact on long-run net migration” through the Graduate and Skilled Worker visa routes.
The skills puzzle
The central piece of this year’s review is driven by the observation that the new government’s intention is “to more closely link migration and skills policy.” Given that starting point, the MAC carefully explores to what extent this can work. It’s of course written in the careful language you would expect of a government-sponsored committee with a Home Office secretariat, but reading between the lines there’s a cautionary note to it all (and not just in the observation that “skills” is an “ambiguous term both conceptually and empirically” – don’t tell Jacqui Smith).
“In theory”, MAC observes, skills shortages lead employers to recruit using the immigration system. “If this were true,” the government can bring down work-related immigration via the reduction of skills shortages.
In practice, there are some complications. Most obviously, skills investments take a long time to translate to the labour market – the last government repeatedly took the quicker route of facilitating international recruitment, especially in the health and care sectors, but also in not insignificant ways in areas like filling teacher vacancies.
The MAC also stresses how employers will not deliberately make choices around whether to hire UK-based workers or those from overseas (speaking to The Times, Brian Bell specifically points to academic recruitment as an area where employers – universities – would not change their hiring practices if the domestic labour force had better qualifications). We are also told that labour demand and supply are not independent (“employers look for what they think they can get, and employees try to match what employers want”), and that skills aside there are other differences between domestic and international recruits.
For the construction industry, this latter point was vividly illustrated by the Financial Times last week, which argued that many businesses in this field prefer “pay-by-the-day” labour and self-employed staff, and hence hire internationally and typically not via skilled worker routes – another consequence of this is that they are unlikely to commit to training apprentices. (The article also cites Brian Bell saying that high net migration leads to “real strains on our ability to manage housing and infrastructure,” in case anyone was thinking the MAC will take a more dovish approach under Labour.)
All in all, bringing about a join-up between the skills and migration systems is a tough ask – or, more cynically, an unrealistic policy goal. It’s clear that the MAC is trying to temper expectations about what can be achieved:
Linking immigration and skills policy is not a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach and it is important to consider the individual circumstances within sectors and occupations, including diagnosing whether shortages are genuinely driven by a lack of skills or are due to poor pay and conditions of certain roles.
And the elephant in the room is pay. In the care sector, the MAC has repeatedly stressed that wages need a significant uplift for other visa-related tinkering to have an impact. It stresses this again here, and makes the point that a large proportion of work visas go to public sector workers.
This is a point for Skills England to take on board as well, you would hope. Its initial report was notably incurious about the role of low pay (especially in the public sector) in driving “skills mismatches”, rather presenting employment more as a simple supply and demand relationship between skills available and skills needed. The MAC annual report has some more persuasive analysis here, showing a lack of correlation between so-called “skills shortage vacancies” (SSVs) and skilled worker visa usage. That is to say, it’s by no means a given that those industries facing skills shortages are the ones more likely to sponsor workers from overseas. There are all kinds of factors at play.
Quad to the rescue
You get the sense that the team of economists who make up the Migration Advisory Committee are being careful about the government’s plans to link up skills and migration in a coherent way (it’s also noted at one point that skills is devolved and immigration is not – another challenge).
What we’re getting to make this all fit together is a new “Quad framework” (I believe this is the first time it’s publicly been referred to in this way). As promised in Labour’s manifesto, the strengthened MAC will be working with the newly launched Industrial Strategy Council, the Department for Work and Pensions, and Skills England – the manifesto in fact promised “skills bodies across the UK”, but this hasn’t been fleshed out yet.
This Quad will cooperate “to address systemic long-term issues that have led to reliance from certain sectors on international recruitment, and where appropriate, to reduce that reliance.” The MAC anticipates that the Quad will help identify priority sectors (following the industrial strategy, when ready) and determine which have a high reliance on migration, after which the MAC will – if it sees fit – recommend policy levers the government might pull, while Skills England will be drawing up workforce and skills plans, of some sort.
It’s all a recipe for an incredibly complicated set of moving parts, and given Skills England’s involvement and the importance of overseas staff and student recruitment, one that the English higher education sector would be wise to keep an eye on and work out how it can contribute to.
