UK HOME OFFICE NEWS July 17, 2019 – Tier 2 / Tier 4 A Sponsor License will now be “revoked” to British companies hiring foreign employees for “misbehaviour” – such as tweeting a racist remark”

Tier 2 and 4 Sponsor License Guidance is updated every few months with a small correction, deletion or amendment. 

Today version 40 came out with a new Addendum published on JULY 17, 2017 v10. 

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/818265/2019-07-17_Tier-2-5-sponsor-guidance_Mar-2019_v1.0_with_addendum.pdf

  1. When a sponsor is granted a Tier 2 or Tier 5 licence, significant trust is placed in them. With this trust comes a direct responsibility to act in accordance with the Immigration Rules, all parts of the Tiers 2 and 5 sponsor guidance, and with wider UK law. 
  1. There is also a wider responsibility for sponsors to behave in a manner that is consistent with our fundamental values and that is not detrimental to the wider public good. Sponsorship is a privilege, not a right. The Home Office will not license organisations whose actions and behaviour are non-conducive to the public good. These include but are not limited to:

• fostering hatred or inter-community division;

• fomenting, justifying or glorifying terrorism; and/or;

• rejecting the rights of, or discriminating against, other groups or individuals on the basis of their gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, marital status, race, religious belief (including lack of belief), or any other protected characteristic under the Equality Act 2010.

  1. The Home Office will refuse a sponsor licence application or take the appropriate compliance actions, if it becomes known to us that a prospective or existing sponsor has engaged in such behaviour or actions. The compliance action taken will depend on the gravity of the behaviour and actions but could include compliance actions up to and including revocation. 

Part 3 is the interesting part here! This leads us to a very interesting legal argument – who will be the appropriate compliance body here and based upon what facts?

Basic Facts – 

  1. If a British company has its TIER 2 license, they have the right to hire foreign employees. There are 30,294 Companies licensed today.
  2. If a British University or Education provider have a Tier 4 license, they have the right to teach foreign students. There are 1,228 Education providers.

Some companies hire hundreds of foreign employees. Some Universities hire thousands of foreign students. When a license is revoked – every foreigner who is sponsored by that sponsor license MUST leave the UK or find a new employer/ school.  

So … will a company lose the license due to a Home Office officer reading a “tweet” by the CEO of a company that he writes at 10.00 pm when he left the pub…a message that was written out of text, or will a company that has to fire two hundred people because of shortcuts, who then shout out “discimination?” – are these companies not behaving in a manner that is consistent with the Home Office fundamental values.  

Will this outrageous and escalated penalty of the revocation of the licenses be tried in a Court of Law or will it be that the Home Office Sponsor Unit sends an email to render a license revoked immediately. 

Will the current staff have a say or 20 days to respond or will the Home Office ask the company to change its Authorising officer to keep their license? 

The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, was signed by 27 nations, including Russia, most of South America, Europe, and Australia.

It defines “racial discrimination” as: – “any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour,  descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life”. It excludes affirmative action and discrimination against non-citizens.”

So in effect – if it includes “ discrimination against non-citizens” – however by revoking a Tier 2 Sponsor license of a British Company- and having all its “foreign employees” sent home and loosing their jobs – is this not indirect discrimination against non-citizens? So the Home Office can be actually causing discrimination according to Article 1 part 1 of The Convention. 

Remainers are saying that BREXIT and Trump Administration are a direct cause to the rise in hate crimes in the UK.  Brexiteers and Leavers are saying that the censorship platforms should remain open so that free speech allows others to talk openly and to stop “taking offence” for everything said. 

When a clear Pro Europe “Remainer” goes public by preparing to file a lawsuit against the next Prime Minister of England, should he be required as a last attempt to hold on to the countries dignity and have to prorogue Parliament in the event that MPs try to stop him taking Britain out of the EU without a deal, people respond that her actions are out of line and endanger the further delay of BREXIT. Her blatant response is not to take a legal defence standing, but to argue that because she was not born in the UK,  that she is being harrased with racist and gender discrimination messages and that if a man “such as John Major” would had filed the same suit, this would not be racist…. But WHO is to decide that it was or wasn’t racist or discriminatory ONLY a Court of LAW…    

Will we now see departments of the Government taking the Law into their own hands, closing down businesses, revoking these licenses and having to return thousands of foreign employees back to their homelands without going through the legal and correct jurisdiction?  

So all said – this new policy looks like another British Home Office Government Policy that has no logic and will cause a lot more damage than good.

Written by Daliah Sklar Founder of DRSI LAW www.drsi-law.com

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