Do we need to stop our reliance on migrant workers?

KEIR STARMER’S plans to train more UK workers is a great idea. I used to help adults improve reading and writing skills as a volunteer. I met the most remarkable people with hidden talents. The companies they worked for trained them so they could earn a living and many went on to buy their own homes. It would be great to help people with more education and training in jobs, not to forget the younger generation.

P. O’CONNOR, Blackpool, Lancs. AS A time-served engineer, I was sold out by the AEU in the 1970s when they amalgamated to form the AEUW. That merger — abetted by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), who sold the lie that robots and automation meant skill would never be needed in the future — ended all union representation that skilled engineers had. The only time I was ever on strike was because my employers wanted to increase skilled workers’ pay, to attract skilled workers. The union wouldn’t allow it unless the whole workforce voted in favour. The workforce, being about 90 per cent unskilled, voted against. So no pay increase for anyone. Sir Keir has stated that he will encourage British firms to train more workers. That is what my Brexit vote was expecting to happen. It’s taken six years but that’s enough to prompt me to vote labour for the first time in my life.

DAVID SYMONS, Skelmersdale, Lancs. TONY DANKER, head of the CBI, calls for more ‘economic migration’, in return for which he suggests the extra visas could be limited to a fixed term. Does he seriously envisage that many of the new visa holders would actually leave the country when these expire? It would be convenient if an employer’s (perhaps transient) requirement for a (generally low-paid) worker could be met by someone who magically appears and disappears in line with this need. Migrant labour may be such a commodity. But while a firm can wash its hands of them, Britain may have to provide such workers with a livelihood for years to come. The CBI’s style is to bring in extra workers, then complain that someone else failed to provide accommodation for them. Much policy which may be presented as ‘compassionate’ would more plausibly be seen as a hidden subsidy for users of cheap labour. Ought we to consider why so many of the people we are producing turn out to be the wrong sort for UK industry? JOHN RISELEY, Harrogate, North Yorkshire