Home Office forces Uni's to act as immigration informers

Outcry from lecturers over plans to make them ’spies’.University of London staff have fiercely denounced new government rules which will force university staff to report international students who fail to turn up to class to border authorities.

An implementation plan for new immigration rules, published on October 30^th, will see universities receive licences from the United Kingdom Border Authority (UKBA) and operate as students’ sponsors, reporting those who do not enrol, miss tutorials or coursework submissions, or who discontinue their studies.

The measures, which will be phased in over a twelve month period starting in March 2009, require universities to acquire licences in order to recruit students from outside the European Economic Area (EEA), and are part of a new Australian-style points based immigration system.

A letter published in the Guardian newspaper and signed by over 200 academics in the 24 hours before it was printed said: “The new immigration rules for overseas students to be introduced in March 2009 by the Border Agency are very worrying”.

“The university is being asked to act as an immigration officer and set up a surveillance unit over these students. This goes far beyond the present monitoring of student progress systems in universities, which has as its basic purpose assisting students to reach their full potential.”

At the time of going to press, the number of signatories had reached around 360, including staff from the LSE, SOAS, UCL and Birkbeck College, the letter’s author Ian Grigg-Spall said.

Speaking to London Student, Mr Grigg-Spall, a lecturer at Kent University Law School and Academic chair of the National Critical Lawyers Group, said: “This is a matter of principle. It breaches academic freedom and universities’ autonomy.”

“Relationships between staff and students rely on trust, this creates mistrust and destroys that relationship”.

“The idea that universities must know where students are at all times is just wrong as a matter of principle,” he added.

Read more at London Student

UCU Prseident Sally Hunt, said: "We have grave concerns that new rules on monitoring foreign students have been pulled together without any consultation with the people who would be tasked with their implementation. We do not believe it is appropriate or effective to task colleges and universities with the policing of immigration."

To read the UCU's response, click here:
http://www.ucu.org.uk/index.cfm?articleid=3599
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7719476.stm - BBC To read the letter,
click here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/nov/10/immigration-policy-immigratio
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For more, click here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/nov/10/international-students-migra
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See facebook campaign from NUS International Students Officer

UK Border Agency given Police powers

There is an article in the free paper 'Metro' today, in the series entitled [ironically so, (see below)] 'Real People', in which a 28 year old Arrest Team Leader from the UK Border Agency describes her work..

Vikki Lacey says, "If I felt sorry for everyone I wouldn't get out of bed. I just have to treat them as cases rather than people".... "The raids are fun. I'm not tied to my desk and every day is different".

Describing how things have changed for the better since the time when, "We were very restricted in what we could do as we had to rely on the police", she tells Metro readers how, "Now we can be more proactive and go out with our own teams".... "I've been trained to use a baton and handcuffs" .... "Sometimes, however, you can get violence".

She explains how the emphasis now is on workplace raids but they still raid people's houses, an action which "We tend to do very early in the morning".

She does not reveal whether she is a member of either the PCS union or the Immigration Officers house 'union'. Of course, some of the people doing this work are indeed PCS members.