Brexit: Business leader urges ‘London visa’ as Sadiq Khan tries to save City’s trading status

London should be given its own visa system to prevent a flight of skilled workers, it was claimed
Getty Images

London needs its own visa system to stop a flight of highly skilled workers from the capital once Britain has left the European Union, a top business leader said today.

Colin Stanbridge, chief executive of the London Chamber of Commerce, said: “It is crucial to the future of the London economy that the capital continues to have a flow of migrant workers to help our capital thrive. Without them, success cannot be guaranteed, without their work and efforts our city would slowly grind to a halt.”

He called on Mayor Sadiq Khan to set up a London visa system in partnership with his Business Advisory Council to allow skilled workers from the EU to remain in the capital.

Mr Stanbridge said: “This would provide a collective body that could guarantee a third-party sponsorship route for registered sector-specific firms with recognised skills deficiencies.”

The call came as fears grew about possible job losses in the City and elsewhere in the capital. Some estimates suggested up to 40,000 posts could be stripped from the financial services sector and moved Paris, Dublin and Frankfurt. An estimated 920,000 people work in financial and business services in London.

Sam Alderson, economist at the Centre for Economics and Business Research, said: “There is going to be a negative impact, but there is a caveat to that. The outlook for jobs was already quite negative in terms of activity in areas such as M&A [mergers and acquisitions].

“The longer term impact very heavily depends on the negotiations, particularly in areas such as passporting rights [the system that allows UK-regulated banks to operate across the European Union]. Without that there is going to be a huge threat to financial services and insurance jobs in the City.”

Mr Khan has said the loss of passporting rights would be “a disaster”. He said: “I’ll be pushing the Treasury to make sure passporting is top of their priority list, which is why I will be seeking a conversation with the Chancellor as soon as possible.” The Mayor has already spoken to Bank of England governor Mark Carney about how the City can protect its status.

Mr Khan is also seeking “urgent clarity” over the 850,000 EU citizens living and working in the capital. “We will also need future answers on visas if we are to support companies locating in London,” he said.

Although no banks have confirmed how many jobs will move from London, one City figure suggested many could go to Edinburgh if Scotland breaks away from the UK and stays inside the EU. He said: “Edinburgh could be a big beneficiary.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in