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Youth Mobility Scheme: The Panacea for Ending Free Movement?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Erica Consterdine
Erica Consterdine*
Affiliation:
Department of Geography/Sussex Centre for Migration Research, University of Sussex
*
E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Free movement has been at the heart of the Brexit debate, with the government grappling between satisfying public and business demands for restrictive and liberal approaches to immigration respectively. In response the government have advocated temporary migration as a potential solution, including an expanded UK-EU Youth Mobility Scheme (YMS) modelled on the current T5 YMS on the assumption that YMS migrants undertake low-skilled jobs. Little is known about this visa or the labour market activity of YMS migrants. Drawing on policy analysis alongside survey and interview data from Australian YMS migrants, this paper seeks to bridge some of these knowledge gaps, arguing that an expanded EU YMS will not attract significant EU migrants, and is far from a remedy for free movement ending.

Keywords

youth mobility schemetemporary immigrationBrexitlabour marketUK immigration policyF22J08
Type
Research Articles
Information
National Institute Economic Review , Volume 248 , May 2019 , pp. R40 - R48
Copyright
Copyright © 2019 National Institute of Economic and Social Research

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Footnotes

This research was supported under the Temporary versus Permanent Migration project (TEMPER). This project received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no 613488. With thanks to Alexandra Urdea, Martine Huberty and Adam Prangnell who provided research assistance.

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