Permits Foundation Newsletter Round-Up of 2017

Permits Foundation has had a busy 12 months with policy developments, events, webinars and useful resources to share with our Sponsors. With so much going on, we thought we would share this handy summary of our 2017 highlights.

Making Headway in India

In early November Permits Foundation Board Member Katy van der Wilk and Executive Director Michiel van Campen visited New Delhi for talks with the Ministry of Home Affairs and other key stakeholders. The aim of the visit was to discuss the Foundation´s proposal for spouse work authorisation, linked to an intra-corporate transfer visa. It was an informative and useful visit. At the political level, our proposal has already received support in principle from Minister Rijiju. It is now the role of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Foreigners Division to examine the proposal in detail. We will keep you updated.

A Successful Biennial Conference

Did you join us in October at our international symposium in London? The event entitled Family Matters in Global Mobility and hosted by PwC, brought together high level speakers from business and policy to highlight to our network why now is the time to speak up for dual careers in the global workplace. At the end of the conference we announced our survey on Brexit which will be launched early 2018 (we hope you will participate; more information on this will follow in January). Permits Foundation also honoured Founding Board Member Katy van der Wilk, now passing the Executive Director baton on to Michiel van Campen. Thankfully we retain Katy’s expertise as she will be remaining on the Permits Foundation Board. Read our full conference summary here.

EU Legal Migration Consultation

In September, Permits Foundation responded to the EU Commission’s legal migration “Fitness Check”, looking into the relevance, coherence, effectiveness, efficiency and EU added value of legal migration legislation (for non-EU citizens). The Fitness Check offered the opportunity to provide feedback on several key pieces of EU legal migration legislation. In our response we focused on the issues that matter most to our sponsors – namely the Intra Corporate Transferees Directive and the EU Blue Card Scheme. We highlighted the importance of family access to employment as a key factor in attracting and retaining talent. A Commission analysis of the consultation is expected by early 2018.

Advocacy Work Around Revised EU Blue Card

We’ve been engaging with representatives from the European Commission, Parliament and Council and will continue to do so during this crucial phase in the EU revised Blue Card negotiations. The EU is looking to replace national schemes and the current Blue Card with a more harmonized scheme in order to attract greater numbers of highly skilled talent. However the new proposal risks a backwards step by introducing a possible labour market check for family members before they can access employment. Read about our work on this.

Clarifying the Intra Corporate Transfer Directive in the Netherlands

We hosted a fruitful meeting in The Hague in February, bringing together Sponsors and representatives from the Dutch Government to discuss concerns about certain aspects of the Intra Corporate Transferee Directive. A number of issues were raised including the need to continue an international assignment uninterrupted after the initial 3 year period allowed under the ICT Directive. With follow up correspondence from Permits Foundation, the situation was clarified. With thanks to the Dutch Ministry of Security and Justice for their openness and co-operation.

Global Forum for Migration and Development, the Business Mechanism

The Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) is the key international forum to address migration and development interconnections, with a focus on action. The GFMD Business Mechanism serves as a platform for the private sector to engage with Governments and other stakeholders on migration issues, including addressing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. It also provides support and assistance to the development of the United Nations Global Compact on Migration.

Based on Permits Foundation’s research and interventions, the GFMD Business Mechanism explicitly recommended at the Berlin summit in 2017 in its advice “Towards a Global Compact on Migration: Perspectives on Labour Migration from the GFMD Business Mechanism”, that “Migration policies should foster family unity by creating accessible pathways for accompanying family to obtain work authorization”.

Another Win in Latin America – Peru

Hot on the heels of Brazil, we saw another Latin American country move to our best practice category. In March, Peru issued a new migration decree that regulates the entry, exit, stay and residence of foreigners. The decree introduces and re-orders a wide range of visas in Temporary and Residence categories and overall makes the regulations more business-friendly. Significantly, it includes work authorization for family members of new Residence visa holders, as well as Peruvian nationals

Useful Resources

Sponsor Brochure: Underpinning all of our progress in the work that we do is the support of our Sponsors. We look forward to extending our network in 2018 as we look to make headway in enabling dual careers across the globe. We encourage you to spread the word about our work and to let us know about your priority countries. We recently updated the Sponsor brochure with a whole new page (5) on how we promote change.

Updated Global Summary: 30 countries now allow accompanying spouses or partners to be freely employed or self-employed during an expatriate assignment. This was only a small handful when Permits Foundation started in 2001. A useful overview of how different countries stand on the issue of work authorization for family members can be viewed in our recently updated global summary of country regulations.

Speaking up for Dual Careers

Throughout the year the team has been meeting our Sponsors face to face, participating in events, speaking at conferences and online webinars to raise the profile of Permits Foundation and the importance of enabling dual careers in the global workplace. Highlights include presenting at theInternational Bar Association Global Immigration Conference, the Global Immigration Law Summit and featuring in CFGI and NetExpat webinars. We are grateful to our Board Members, Sponsor organisations and our wider network who have also been using their platform to advocate for the Foundation. As well as our regular newsletters, you can keep up to date with our continued work in 2018 by following us on Twitter @PermitsLobby, our company page on linked in or via the news section of our website.

Keep an Eye on in 2018

With migration policy grabbing headlines across the globe, next year looks set to be an extremely busy one. We will as always be monitoring legislative developments and advocating for improvement where opportunities arise. Following our visit, we will of course be looking for movement on ICT spouse employment authorization in India. In South Africa we will be encouraging positive steps in relation to the immigration white paper. In the EU we are following implementation of the ICT Directive and will keep advocating against policy roll back in the revised Blue Card scheme. Similarly we will be working with the CFGI and looking to safeguard employment rights for H4 visa spouses in the US. We will continue to explore opportunities in China, one of our top priority countries. And look out for our Brexit survey in the first months of 2018!

Thank you for your encouraging feedback and support over the year. On behalf of the Board and the Permits Team we wish you a happy, peaceful holiday season and look forward to pursuing our goals in 2018.

The Permits Foundation Team:

Michiel van Campen, Executive Director

Françoise van Roosmalen, Sponsor Relations & Accounts

Helen Frew, International Advocacy Advisor

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