Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate she has made of the cost to businesses in Linlithgow and East Falkirk constituency of the Immigration Skills charge for the current financial year.

The Immigration Skills Charge was introduced on 6 April 2017. It is a charge on UK employers who sponsor workers from outside the European Economic Area through the Tier 2 skilled worker route.

We have not modelled the cost of the Immigration Skills Charge on any individual business. The cost will depend on whether employers choose to use the Tier 2 route and will vary depending on the number of Certificates of Sponsorship employers choose to assign, whether they pay the standard or reduced rate, and the length of time an employer chooses to employ a worker for.