We launched our international report on high-skilled immigration, Passport to Progress, in partnership with ABE Global, an education non-profit, with an event in the House of Lords on 6 September 2023.
ABE’s CEO Rob May delivered the following remarks at the launch:
Back in 1973, business leaders from the Ford Motor Company, Unilever, and Macmillan Publishing called a meeting with a group of senior academics to lament the fact that there was very little in the way of practical training in international business skills, for the managers dispersed across their far-flung global operations. Out of that meeting, ABE was created, and in the 50 years since, we have been guided by a simple idea; that the transference of skills and ideas across borders is the key to productivity and prosperity.
We delivered our first courses in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore, and then we set our sights on the profound challenge of stimulating a ‘great circulation’ of talent. We focused on exporting standards and qualifications to the emerging economies of the global south. Through the power of education, we have worked to develop a global community of practice in which business methods at all levels are consistent, reliable, ethical, and conducive to how we do business. This has enabled people across the world to enjoy access to inclusive economic opportunity, we know this because as ABE expanded its operations across four continents, we have been delighted and honoured to support hundreds of thousands of personal journeys. These journeys have enriched the lives not just of individuals, but of whole communities, and in turn, inspired further opportunities for invention and innovation.
So, you could say that talent mobility has been our concern and our passion for five decades.
Therefore, we feel bound to respond when we notice a worrying trend; the ramping-up of anti-immigration attitudes, provocative and polarising rhetoric, and restrictive policies, leading to fewer bright and talented individuals thinking about coming to Britain to start a business.
By definition, immigrants bring diverse experiences and perspectives to our companies, surely an advantage in our global marketplace. They can also expand economic horizons by strengthening commercial ties between their host country and their homelands. But above all else, faced with a burning platform of economic stagnation, ecosystem damage, public health crises and technological disruption, there is an urgent imperative to foster better international, and multi-cultural, integration, if we are to confront these challenges successfully.
Although humanity is locked in almost 200 distinct countries and economies, human societies have always interacted intensely, as ideas, talent, and enterprise flow to where they can have the most impact. At the same time, we recognise that immigration is a divisive subject, but the whole topic of talent migration is in danger of drifting into the wrong lane. This report, Passport to Progress, grabs the steering wheel and brings us back to a reasoned debate on the way forward. It provides powerful evidence; a comparative analysis of visa policy interventions that are working successfully, around the world, and it offers clear advice for changemakers on what we are doing well and what we could do better.
I encourage everyone to read this report, embrace its recommendations, and share these ideas widely. I hope that we can come together to create a firebreak against the creeping entanglement of migratory issues, and in turn, unlock a sensible conversation on the vital link between immigration and innovation.