Tories reject calls for new visa scheme to keep talented graduates in country

CALLS for Scotland to be allowed to operate its own scheme to retain thousands of talented international graduates have been rejected by Theresa May’s Government.

The move comes despite claims it would create such a system for a handful of elite universities in the south of England. Scrapping the system of post-study work visas four years ago had made Scotland a less attractive destination to study, MPs warned on the Scottish Affairs Committee earlier this year.

They also found that the number of non-EU students remaining in the UK as a whole after graduation had tumbled by 80 per cent. They called for a new scheme to address Scotland’s population needs and fill skills gaps in the NHS and finance.

But Conservative immigration minister Robert Goodwill rejected the idea.

The UK Government also criticised the previous scheme saying it had been subject to “widespread abuse” which had damaged the reputation of the education system. Tory ministers said that visa applications from international students to study at Scottish universities had increased by 10 per cent since 2010.

“Applying different immigration rules to different parts of the UK would complicate the immigration system, harming its integrity, and cause difficulties for employers with a presence in more than one part of the UK,” it concluded. Critics have accused the Home Office of already creating a two tier system after it announced a new two-year pilot of post-work study visas over the summer.

There was uproar when it emerged that only four elite universities in the south of England would be allowed to take part. SNP MP Pete Wishart, chairman of the Scottish Affairs Committee, said that he was extremely disappointed by the Government’s response.

“Despite the almost universal support for improving post-study work schemes in Scotland, we are still to see these factors have any influence.”

Former Labour first minister Lord McConnell said: “This response from the Government just proves how ridiculous their discriminatory project is.

“If they genuinely wanted to look at the evidence ... then they would have had a pilot project that was firstly transparent and secondly included a university from the north of England, from Scotland and from others parts of the country.” pilot