Recession effect: UK cuts jobs for foreign workers

Responding to global economic downturn and job losses, a key Home Office committee has cut the number and categories of jobs available for migrants from outside the European Union, including from India.

The Migration Advisory Committee said 270,000 less posts should be on the "shortage list" of jobs, which allows employers to bring in foreign workers without trying to fill them with British staff first.

In the latest review published today, construction workers and quantity surveyors were suspended from the list because unemployment among workers in those professions has risen by 500 per cent as a result of the downturn.

Social workers dealing with adults have also been taken off and it will be made harder to bring in care assistants and chefs.