经济学人下载:英国的新移民政策让护理人员何去何从?

Britain
英国

Immigration
移民

Who cares?
谁在意？

New immigration rules would exclude the key workers Britain relies on
新的移民政策将把英国所依赖的重要劳工排除在外

"Care work isn't just bum wiping," insists Karolina Gerlich. In the 12 years since she swapped her native Poland for Britain, aged 18, she has learnt that it involves being a "PA, a nurse, a therapist, an occupational therapist, a dietician and a friend". She now runs a charity supporting other carers, while working as one herself. Yet under post-Brexit immigration rules due to take effect in January, a similar applicant would be turned down for a visa, since the job is classed as low-skilled. "I feel disrespected, offended and like my contribution to the economy and to the country has not been recognised at all."
“护理工作不仅仅是擦屁股，”卡罗丽娜·杰利坚持说道。18岁时她从祖国波兰来到英国，12年来她认识到护理人员是“私人助理、护士、治疗师、职业治疗师、营养师和朋友”。她现在经营一家为护理人员提供帮助的慈善机构，同时她本人也是一名护理人员。然而，根据将于明年1月生效的脱欧后移民法规定，类似职业的申请人将被拒绝申请签证，因为该工作被归类为低技能工作。“我感觉自己没有受到尊重，我被冒犯了，我觉得自己对经济和国家的贡献完全没有得到承认。”

The timing of the covid-19 pandemic puts Priti Patel, the hardline home secretary, in an awkward spot. Recognising that Britain's vote to leave the EU in 2016 was in part down to a desire to curb immigration, she plans to end freedom of movement from the bloc and apply the same salary threshold (￡25,600, or $31,200, for most) and skills requirement to prospective migrants wherever they come from. Yet many of the incomers such a policy would rule out—including care-home workers—are those classified by the government as the pandemic's "key workers".
新冠让强硬的内政大臣蒲丽迪·帕特尔(Priti Patel)陷入尴尬境地。她承认英国2016年脱欧投票的部分目的是遏制移民，她计划终止欧盟之间的移民自由，并对往后来自其他国家的所有移民设立同样的工资门槛(多数为2.56万英镑，合3.12万美元)和技能要求。然而，将被该政策排除在外的移民——包括家庭护理人员——正是被政府列为此次流行病的“重要工作人员”。

A paper by researchers at Oxford University, published on May 14th, finds that nearly one in five of those working in essential care-related occupations are immigrants. In all, a little more than half of EU migrants now classed as key workers would not have qualified for a work visa under the new dispensation. Using a different definition of key worker (the category is blurry), the Institute for Public Policy Research, a think-tank, finds that 71% of such migrants would have been excluded.
牛津大学的研究人员于5月14日发表的一篇论文称，在从事基本医疗相关职业的人员中，有近五分之一是外来移民。总体来说，在目前被列为“重要工作人员”的欧盟移民中，有略超一半的移民没有资格在新的分配制度下获得工作签证。公共政策研究所，一家智库，使用另外一种不同的对“重要工作人员”的定义(类别模糊)发现，该类移民将有71%被排除在外。

In one sense, the pandemic takes the pressure off. A deep recession should limit the need to import low-paid workers, since there will be a large pool of unemployed domestic labour. Yet farms are flying in workers from Romania, suggesting that Britons on their uppers might hesitate before taking back-breaking or low-paid jobs.
从某种意义上来说，此次流行病减轻了压力。严重的经济衰退会限制对引进低薪工人的需求，因为将出现一大批失业的家政劳工。然而，农场上正飞来大批的罗马尼亚劳工，这表明经济状况良好的英国人在从事劳累不堪或者报酬微薄的工作前可能会有所犹豫。

The political argument for a restrictive regime is weakening. Voters were warming to immigration even before they voted to leave the EU and thereby restrict it. The scandal in 2018 over the government's shoddy treatment of the Windrush generation of Caribbean migrants illustrated that, if the public senses injustice, crackdowns can prove as politically perilous as liberal approaches. A survey in March by Ipsos MORI, a pollster, found that the overwhelming majority of voters want the number of migrants coming to Britain to work in care homes to stay the same or rise. Since the pandemic and its associated recession will significantly reduce overall immigration. Anyway, Ms Patel can afford to be a little more generous.
支持实行限制性制度的政治论据正在减弱。甚至在投票决定退出欧盟并以此来限制移民之前，选民们就已经对移民产生了热情。2018年英国政府对加勒比风暴潮一代移民处理不当的丑闻表明，如果公众感受到了不公平，那么镇压行动在政治上可能就与自由主义的做法一样危险。民意调查机构伊普索莫利(Ipsos mori)在3月份进行的一项调查发现，绝大多数选民希望来英国工作的移民数量保持不变或增加。无论如何，由于此次流行病和与之相关的经济衰退将大大减少移民数量，帕特尔女士也稍显慷慨一些。