January 28, 2020


Dear John xxxxxx,

January 31 will mark Brexit Day, the United Kingdom's departure from the European Union, if the withdrawal agreement clears its final hurdles with the European Parliament and Council this week.

The Brexit referendum outcome in 2016 was driven in significant measure by public desire to dramatically curb immigration. But the intervening period has yet to produce an answer as to what Brexit will mean for the future scale and form of mobility across the Channel -- and whether this will be for the better or the worse.

"The Johnson government is trying to use Brexit as an opportunity to position the United Kingdom as a major player in the global race for talent, but it may have underestimated the knock-on effects of ending free movement -- and the extent to which it can move unilaterally," Meghan Benton, research director for MPI's International Program, writes in a new commentary.

In sectors such as tech and finance, for example, the big question will be whether London maintains its global edge -- an outcome dependent on the contours of the overall trade deal UK and EU negotiators hammer out, and whether businesses relocate. And the overall attractiveness of the United Kingdom to skilled workers could dim regardless of the form of the "Australian-style points-based system" promised by Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

"Ultimately, it is unclear whether Brexit will allow the United Kingdom to cast the net wider for the global workers it hopes to attract, or will deepen the moat around the island," Benton writes.

I commend this commentary to your attention. You can read it here: www.migrationpolicy.org/news/brexit-day-dawning-age-immobility.

Best regards,

Michelle Mittelstadt
Director of Communications and Public Affairs,
Migration Policy Institute

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