Immigration: Students

Lord Bilimoria Excerpts

Thursday 25th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bilimoria (CB)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Brown of Cambridge, on her excellent maiden speech. I have known her for almost a decade, since I was the founder of the UK-India Business Council. Now she is the vice-chancellor of Aston University in Birmingham and I am the Chancellor of the University of Birmingham; we are neighbours. She has taken her title as Cambridge because she is a staunch alumna of Murray Edwards College, known in our day as New Hall, which is one of only three women-only colleges remaining in Cambridge. Her career in the field of engineering is outstanding—from working at Rolls-Royce to heading the engineering faculty at Imperial College in London, to her famous King review in 2008 on carbon emissions from road transport. Not content with being a world-renowned expert in the field of engineering and science, with awards too numerous for me to list, she is also married to Dr Colin Brown, the engineering director at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. We look forward very much to her contributions in the years to come.

Aung San Suu Kyi, Bill Clinton, Desmond Tutu and Mahatma Gandhi all studied at UK universities. They are the finest universities on this planet along with those of the United States of America, and yet the Government continue to classify international students as immigrants when calculating the net immigration figures, as well as having a target to reduce net immigration to fewer than 100,000. Then, hypocritically, the Government say that there are no limits to international students. Logically, there is no way the Government will meet their targets unless they reduce international student numbers. They have done the right thing in closing down bogus colleges and we all agree with that, but now their policies are damaging genuine international students at our world-class universities. I see this every day in my role as president of UKCISA.

At the University of Birmingham, 20% of our student body is made up of international students and 33% of our academic staff are from overseas. BIS itself states that international students bring in more than £13 billion a year in overseas earnings, and yet, in the words of Professor Leszek Borysiewicz, vice-chancellor of the University of Cambridge,

“the potential economic gains for the UK for recruiting more overseas students are being sacrificed at the altar of political expediency”.

He went on to say that it is “ludicrous” to include overseas students in UK immigration targets. Our competitor countries do not categorise international students as immigrants. In the US they are included as non-immigration admissions, while in Australia they are reported as net temporary arrivals. In Canada they are placed in the temporary resident category. I ask the Minister this: why can we not do the same? In fact, the Prime Minister himself has said to me that he would be open to this idea.

The Government are unnecessarily creating a rod for their own back. Furthermore, our competitor countries have ambitious targets to grow international student numbers, accompanied by government action to help them do so. For example, Canada wants to double its number of international students to 450,000 by 2020. In 2014-15 the number of Indian students increased by 32% in the United States, while the number of Indian students coming to the UK has fallen drastically. Does the Minister agree that we should have specific targets to increase the number of international students?

As we have heard, removing our post-study work visa route has also been hugely damaging. An NUS survey found that 51% of students think that the Government are not welcoming towards international students. Universities UK research shows that 22% of the British public considers overseas students not to be immigrants, yet the Government keep relying on International Passenger Survey data, which are completely unreliable. I have repeatedly said that the Government need to reintroduce exit checks at our borders and that all passports, EU and non-EU, need to be scanned in and out of the country. Then, we would have proper control of our borders and we would know the international students coming in and going out.

This year I was appointed chair of the advisory board at Cambridge Judge Business School. Christoph Loch, our director, said that the Government’s current policies,

“not only are ineffective … but outright hostile and unfair toward a population of highly talented people who collectively do have an influence on the reputation of the UK in the world”.

The Government keep talking about the United Nations’ definition of migrants but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, said—I thank her for the debate—no one is suggesting that the UK should stop reporting to the UN or recording student migrant numbers. There is no reason why the UN definition should be used for the particular domestic policy objective of the net migration target. UUK, the Russell group, London First and the NUS all independently agree with what I have said. International students are not only one of our biggest export earners, but one of the strongest elements of our soft power.

The Government have sent a strong message about their intention to keep out migrants who will bring no value to the UK, but they must be equally clear that the UK still wants to attract economically valuable groups, such as genuine international students. Removing this group from the net migration target would send a clear international message that the UK is open to all the amazing benefits that international students provide to our country and to British universities, which are the jewel in our crown.

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[Lord Bates]

That may be so. I would have to look into that point in relation to the north of England, and I am happy to do so. However, the point is that there is no limit on the number of graduate opportunities available. We have special programmes for PhD students and for post-doctoral study. Therefore, we need to get that message out into the wider world much more effectively that Britain welcomes these students and that a range of opportunities exists for students, post-study, to continue to work and gain experience. They can continue on tier 5 with approved internships and training programmes. Twenty-eight thousand organisations have approval to sponsor tier 2 graduate employment opportunities. There is also the PhD entrepreneur route on tier 1. There is a wealth of opportunities for these students.

The noble Lord, Lord Hannay, asked five very pertinent questions and then answered them, albeit not entirely to the Government’s satisfaction. We recognise that our country is experiencing growing pressures from inward migration and its effect on the fabric of society. As a result, we need to take steps to bring net migration down. Of course, you cannot do that simply by changing the figures. It would be very easy to change the figures and, by waving a magic wand, halve net migration. That would be very comfortable but it would not be true. Often people come to this country to study and then stay on. That is why there is a discrepancy between the figure of 117,000 coming in and 40,000 leaving. We need to understand better why we have the 77,000 discrepancy and we need to better understand the data.

The noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, asked for an update on e-borders. Exit checks, which were introduced last year, will give us a better picture of where those people are going. We will publish an update report in May on the progress of e-borders and the exit checks. That will give us greater confidence in this regard.

[Lord Bilimoria]

My Lords, we know that e-borders are not reliable. We have a migration problem with the EU as well. Why do we not institute scanning of all passports—EU and non-EU—at our borders? Then we will have total control. It is easy technology and is available right now.

[Lord Bates]

We will continue to look at these things. The exit checks are the first step to something we hope will help us get a better handle on flows in and out of the country.

I am aware that there is a great deal of expertise in the House, particularly in the higher education sector. We keep debating the numbers, but I urge noble Lords to think that our message should be to sell the incredible opportunities people have when they come to study in some of the greatest universities in the world. As graduates, they will then have the opportunity to work in some of the greatest companies in world. That is a fantastic offer that we can all come together to sell.

[Lord Bates]

I am very happy to look into those two cases for the noble Lord to ensure we get this right. The message has to be clear, and we have to recognise that we have a duty to welcome people coming in to contribute to our economy and to show them the appropriate respect.

I am happy, should the noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, think it an offer worth accepting, to convene a meeting of interested peers and colleagues with our people from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, who have ownership of the universities sector and the tier 2 and tier 4 issues, along with people from the Home Office and immigration enforcement, to discuss how we can tackle these problems and the reasons we are not getting the right message out. We can work together to ensure that our fantastic offer on the world stage is communicated loud and clear: that people from around the world with genuine qualifications and places at great British universities are very welcome and that we are very grateful to them; that, post-study, they will have immense opportunities in this country; and that we would like them to stay and contribute, if they are qualified to do so.

[Lord Bilimoria]

We have all asked for one thing. We are all great ambassadors for British universities—we are their greatest fans—and we will continue to be, but we are asking for one thing. The Prime Minister has said he is open to the idea, and I am sure the Chancellor would be. We are asking the Government to categorise international students separately, in the way that, as we have shown, the USA, Canada and Australia do. That one move would send out a message. The Minister talked about perception. It would remove that perception once and for all. Why can the Government not do it?

[Lord Bates]

The noble Lord, who knows this area inside out, knows that we looked at that very carefully. It is true that the United States separates that category out, but when it calculates net migration, it adds it back in. The United States behaves differently because it does not have a net migration target. We do, and therefore we have chosen to include students in the numbers.