[shyams]

cherdano, on 2016-June-26, 07:32, said:

I bet you have never applied for a VISA or permanent residency in a country that you want to live in/stay in.

It is always a bit of a nerve-wracking process. It is a process in which you have no due process rights, not even a standing to complain if a decision goes against you. There is a lot of paperwork to get right, and in theory your application can get denied just for getting one of the formalities wrong. Well, in the case of the UK, also in practice - the home office is notorious for doing that. And it's not just your own mistakes that could cost you - you also depend on your employer, whose interests don't completely align with yours.

I say all of that from experience of my own (in the US) and friends (in the US or in the UK). Now take into account that most of us (post-docs or permanent employees at highly respected universities, caucasian, a lot of friends to ask who have gone through the process, etc.) are probably among the most priviledged VISA applicants around.

I have experience of going through all the paperwork. After all, I am a naturalised citizen. I originally came here on a work permit many years ago....
And I am of an Asian ethnicity; it should not be too difficult to imagine the kind of difficulties I may have faced applying for visas (whether for the UK or elsewhere in Europe).

As for dealing with Home Office / Foreign Office, I have a personal examples which tells me it's not going to be bad.

• At the end of my work permit period, I was eligible to apply for permanent residence. The whole process took 2-3 days, and required my personal involvement for 15 minutes (filling some sections of a form, signing, and submitting my passport + other documents).
  
• Due to a technical issue with my wife's application, she was initially not granted her permanent residence (she had been visiting her parents when I applied for mine). She called the Home Office helpline. And while it took her 30+ minutes to get through to someone, once she started talking to them they were able to guide her through all processes and get everything sorted. It probably took a day of her personal involvement --- which in the context of a permanent (or at least, multi-decade) plan to reside in the UK was not too much to ask.
  
• I've had many friends and colleagues from my native country visit the UK on business and/or tourism. And despite their skin colour (Asian, like me), I have never heard of anyone being turned down.

What is common to all of the above and people like Helene or you? We are all highly qualified / skilled professionals.

In summary, no -- I absolutely do not think Helene or you have to worry about being asked to leave. This country needs people like you. And will continue to keep the doors open for a wide variety of skilled professionals to come & reside here.

[Lovera]

http://www.independe...s-a7102931.html

[Aberlour10]

Today I read everywhere, young Brits complain... the older generations have stolen their future by voting for leave.

They should ask themselves, why did they not get their ass up und went these few yards to vote.

Only 36% 18-24y old and 58% 25-34y old did it!

its all their own fault

[Winstonm]

Aberlour10, on 2016-June-26, 12:21, said:

Today I read everywhere, young Brits complain... the older generations have stolen their future by voting for leave.

They should ask themselves, why did they not get their ass up und went these few yards to vote.

Only 36% 18-24y old and 58% 25-34y old did it!

its all their own fault

By God when I was their age I had to get up 3 hours before I went to bed...

[cherdano]

shyams, on 2016-June-26, 11:43, said:

I have experience of going through all the paperwork.

My apologies for making wrong assumptions. And thank you for sharing your experiences, I am glad you found them to be positive. (Though I'd wonder whether they'd still have been positive in the years since Theresa May's and David Cameron's "100000 net immigration" pledge.)

I am not as sanguine about it as you are. Maybe because I have seen short-term VISAs denied or delayed for no good reason. Because I have seen colleagues who had to significantly change plans in order to comply with VISA regulations, against what would have been best for their career. Because I have seen too many who couldn't stay on in the US after their post-doc because they checked a wrong box in their J1 VISA application. Because I have seen couples live apart because while they found two jobs at the same place, but one of them didn't qualify for a VISA yet due to the same J1 issue. Because I have seen too many H1B spouses who not only made the sacrifice to move along where their partner's job took them, but by force also the sacrifice of not being able to work at all until their VISA status changed. And to repeat, these are all experiences from within a small, highly privileged class.

Moreover, every single hiring exercise we go through (whether for permanent positions or post-docs or PhD students) reminds me of the mess . Every single hiring process is about three times as bureaucratic as it would have to be, and much less flexible than I'd want it to be - just because we have to comply with (constantly changing) Home Office rules

But finally, your compartmentalising logic also doesn't work for me on a purely emotional level. When I meet a Polish immigrant in the bus, or a Romanian immigrant comes to do a job in our house, or another immigrant takes care of my son in his day care, then I feel I have something in common with them - having immigrated to the same country, maybe having some of the same mixed feelings about it, etc. So when the fromageGBs of the world want those Eastern European immigrants out, then I feel targeted, too. Their anger might not be directed at me, and the Boris Johnson's of Westminster would probably never implemented immigration rules that would life directly difficult for me. But when they target them, I identify; and when Nicola Sturgeon or Sadiq Khan make a point of being welcoming to them and all other immigrants, it touches me on a personal level.

I don't want to complain, as you say my own personal situation will almost certainly be fine. The last few days, I have often been thinking about the other big news from Thursday - the Supreme Court halting Obama's deferred action program, and handing its future back into the hands of Judge Hanen - who seems a rather odd and opinionated character, mildly put. That's 4.5 million people who now, unlike me, actually have to worry about possibly being deported. And many many millions more who'll identify with them, just as I identify with Eastern European immigrants to the UK.

[cherdano]

fromageGB, on 2016-June-26, 10:54, said:

This seems to have happened before the Brexit situation arose, so not really relevant.

You are missing the point. If that can happen to US scientists in the UK before Brexit, then it could possibly happen to EU scientists in the UK after Brexit, depending on coming new immigration rules. (Of course, maybe Boris Johnson fooled you and his government will never actually implement rules to curb immigration from the EU. Ha ha, very funny.)

[Cyberyeti]

cherdano, on 2016-June-26, 15:56, said:

You are missing the point. If that can happen to US scientists in the UK before Brexit, then it could possibly happen to EU scientists in the UK after Brexit, depending on coming new immigration rules. (Of course, maybe Boris Johnson fooled you and his government will never actually implement rules to curb immigration from the EU. Ha ha, very funny.)

I suspect people with a degree are not the immigrants that will be curbed. Note that immigration to Australia went up after they implemented the points system, it just depends what we need. Whether we're competent enough to know what we need however ...

[cherdano]

Cyberyeti, on 2016-June-26, 16:09, said:

I suspect people with a degree are not the immigrants that will be curbed. Note that immigration to Australia went up after they implemented the points system, it just depends what we need. Whether we're competent enough to know what we need however ...

Sorry, I should have quoted the link this was referring to. Here it is again:
http://www.independe...k-a6835766.html

Maybe a post-Brexit immigration policy would be more restrictive AND more rational. I'll believe the Home Office on that when I see it.

[Cyberyeti]

cherdano, on 2016-June-26, 16:29, said:

Sorry, I should have quoted the link this was referring to. Here it is again:
http://www.independe...k-a6835766.html

Maybe a post-Brexit immigration policy would be more restrictive AND more rational. I'll believe the Home Office on that when I see it.

That sounds more like cockup than conspiracy, I didn't say the home office was competent.

[cherdano]

Cyberyeti, on 2016-June-26, 18:33, said:

That sounds more like cockup than conspiracy, I didn't say the home office was competent.

Sigh. Are you intentionally missing the point? No one claimed that this was a conspiracy. The point is that no one wants their basic freedom (as in, not being put in jail in preparation for a deportation without any warning) to depend on the competence of the Home Office.

[1eyedjack]

Not quite interesting storm in a teacup developing is an online petition asking for a re-run of the referendum, that has attracted 3.5m votes (maybe more by now). Anything over 100K votes triggers a parliamentary debate on it. Not that it will get anywhere. The only individuals voting in the petition would be Bremainers. And we already know that there are about 15m of them, so no surprises there.

To be fair, the petition is not quite for a straight re-run. It was initially set up before the referendum took place, and called for a re-run in the event that either victory was less than 60% based on a turnout of less than 75%, which this result was.

What I think would be interesting would be a second referendum asking the same question but open only to those originally registered to vote in the first run, but did not vote first time around, the results then to be added cumulatively to the first set.

[shyams]

cherdano, on 2016-June-26, 15:52, said:

But finally, your compartmentalising logic also doesn't work for me on a purely emotional level. When I meet a Polish immigrant in the bus, or a Romanian immigrant comes to do a job in our house, or another immigrant takes care of my son in his day care, then I feel I have something in common with them - having immigrated to the same country, maybe having some of the same mixed feelings about it, etc. So when the fromageGBs of the world want those Eastern European immigrants out, then I feel targeted, too. Their anger might not be directed at me, and the Boris Johnson's of Westminster would probably never implemented immigration rules that would life directly difficult for me. But when they target them, I identify; and when Nicola Sturgeon or Sadiq Khan make a point of being welcoming to them and all other immigrants, it touches me on a personal level.

I really don't have anything constructive to add because anything I say will either be apologist (I did not want Brexit) or sound extremist (how do I justify throwing out immigrants, if that is what Brexit means?).

The compartmentalisation I used was a rationalisation for "things will not be all bad despite Brexit". And, given a choice between hope and fear, I choose hope. I know that sounds like a car bumper sticker, but I have no better way to describe it.

I don't know how the future will pan out, but I also have a strong belief in the ability of the UK establishment to do great work in a crisis --- e.g. the UK response to the post-Lehman financial crisis was a well-constructed solution which became a template for actions by many other governments.

[Cyberyeti]

cherdano, on 2016-June-27, 00:10, said:

Sigh. Are you intentionally missing the point? No one claimed that this was a conspiracy. The point is that no one wants their basic freedom (as in, not being put in jail in preparation for a deportation without any warning) to depend on the competence of the Home Office.

No, I'm saying one cockup isn't something to base that sort of thing on. It's like saying you're never coming to London because you look like Jean Charles de Menezes and might get shot.

If it starts happening a lot, clearly it's a problem, but one case is not something to overreact to.

[fromageGB]

cherdano, on 2016-June-26, 15:56, said:

You are missing the point. If that can happen to US scientists in the UK before Brexit, then it could possibly happen to EU scientists in the UK after Brexit, depending on coming new immigration rules. (Of course, maybe Boris Johnson fooled you and his government will never actually implement rules to curb immigration from the EU. Ha ha, very funny.)

I know nothing about this beyond the article I read, but I think calling someone who studies Shakespearean history a scientist may be stretching things too far. Obviously he was detained because he was here illegally, the notification presumably being ignored, or lost in the post.

If we implement an Australian style system then no doubt we shall take in people who will in some way contribute to the economy in ways we desire or need, and no doubt we shall temporarily take in students who wish to study. I think it reasonable that there should be a limit to the duration of such study, though. Is 9 years of reading English history not enough? I don't expect the economy has gained much, but I do expect I have paid in some way to his education, even if only in EU grants and the costs of social and infrastructure support.

[fromageGB]

shyams, on 2016-June-27, 02:10, said:

(how do I justify throwing out immigrants, if that is what Brexit means?)

It doesn't.

[shyams]

fromageGB, on 2016-June-27, 04:40, said:

shyams, on 2016-June-27, 02:10, said:

(how do I justify throwing out immigrants, if that is what Brexit means?).

It doesn't.

It does.

[Trinidad]

mgoetze, on 2016-June-24, 05:41, said:

The problem is that the graph shows that Brexit voters are not able to understand it...

Rik

[WellSpyder]

Trinidad, on 2016-June-27, 09:11, said:

The problem is that the graph shows that Brexit voters are not able to understand it...

So do we need to abandon the idea of democracy? Or perhaps replace the nineteenth (eighteenth?) century idea of a minimum property-holding requirement to be eligible to vote with a twenty-first century minimum intelligence requirement??

[RMB1]

WellSpyder, on 2016-June-27, 09:24, said:

So do we need to abandon the idea of democracy? Or perhaps replace the nineteenth (eighteenth?) century idea of a minimum property-holding requirement to be eligible to vote with a twenty-first century minimum intelligence requirement??

We should not rely on referendums. We should elect representatives and let them understand the issues and decide policy.

[mgoetze]

RMB1, on 2016-June-27, 09:43, said:

We should not rely on referendums. We should elect representatives and let themthe people who have enough money to lobby them understand the issues and decide policy.

FTFY.