International Organization for Migration (IOM)

Improving Access to Labour market Information for migrants and employers
26
largely as a consequence of the application of the new information technologies. Thus,
in most EU Member States and settlement countries, government authorities in
charge of migration have established official websites detailing migration legislation
and procedures10 . Reference information provided by way of those official Internet
portals is of particular relevance in the context of demand-driven labour migration
streams, where the responsibility of checking the compliance of a migration candidate
with immigration legislation is largely transferred from the public authorities to the
employers.
Thus, in the United Kingdom, with the introduction of the points-based-system
(PBS) and the increasing importance of the demand-driven tiers – and particularly
Tier 2 – after the 2011 reforms, employers have a greater formal role than before
in the admission of migrants and in ensuring compliance with the legal migration
requirements. The website maintained by the United Kingdom Border Agency
(UKBA) provides specific information for employers willing to recruit workers
from abroad, outlining the sponsorship procedure, which lies at the heart of the
system (http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/business-sponsors/). The sponsorship
procedure foreseen under PBS Tiers 2 and 5 involves several steps and a complex
range of duties for the employer. Failure to follow correct procedures may result
in the loss or downgrading of an employer’s right to sponsorship and, in certain
circumstances, employers may also face fines and/or criminal action. Sponsoring
employers may make use of the UKBA helpline or pay for a customized service from
UKBA, offering direct access to a personal contact within the Agency. The level of
the additional fees required for this tailored service, however, 11 makes it unlikely that
small firms will be able to benefit from it (Chapter 10).
While the contribution of official migration portals to facilitating the flow of
information on the legal procedures to recruit from abroad is well recognized, the
capacity of SMEs to fully navigate those websites to obtain the specific information
needed among a vast array of published material may be somewhat limited by the
typical resource constraints which affect small businesses, including lack of dedicated
administrative staff.
It has to be noted, however, that the capacity of employers – and particularly of SMEs
– to navigate through the information on legal migration procedures published in
official immigration portals also varies depending on the degree of complexity of
the labour migration procedure itself. Thus, in Sweden, where the December 2008
reform has led to the implementation of one single legal channel for labour migration,
86 per cent of the users of the Migration Board’s website declared to be satisfied with
the information provided (Chapter 9).
10 Most of these websites target both employers and prospective migrants. A discussion of the accessibility
and use of internet tools from the migrants’ perspective will be provided in section 2.2.
11 At the time of writing the costs involved are GBP 25,000 per year for a full package and GBP 8,000
per year for a reduced package – see http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/business-sponsors/points/
sponsoringmigrants/premium/.