British IT jobs for British IT workers?

(By Richard Holway 6.00pm 9th March 09) The Association of Professional Staffing Companies (Apsco) applied under the Freedom of Information Act to determine how many foreign IT workers from outside the EU had come to work in the UK in 2008. The answer was 34,430. You can read more in the FT today - Surge in foreign IT as Britons lose jobs

The’problem’ Apsco has with this is that, in the same period, thousands of British IT workers lost their jobs. The 34,430 excludes the many IT workers here from Europe – so the total figure is somewhat higher.

Back in 2006 I was invited to take part in study undertaken by Logica and CBI entitled ‘Building a Competitive IT Services Industry in the UK’. I wrote a paper on the subject of the effect that offshore companies and workers might have on the UK IT Services industry in 2020. As this report was put freely into the public domain by Logica and the CBI and, indeed, was later published on the DTI website, I think I’m free to reproduce below the chart that I put forward at the time. I had forecast that by 2010, some 40% of staff engaged in UK IT services, representing some 20% of revenues, would be serviced by offshore operations in some way (that includes EU). Either by the work actually being undertaken offshore (most particularly in India) by companies such as TCS or Capgemini or by offshore workers coming to work here in the UK (most likely brought in by offshore companies like TCS, Wipro, Infosys etc.) I have no reason to believe that those forecasts made 3 years ago are inaccurate – indeed, if anything, they might be understating the current situation.

My personal view is that British IT jobs should indeed go to British IT workers. This is particularly the case at the lower level jobs. I get really annoyed when politicians say that we need a highly skilled workforce and talk about the shortage of everything from top network designers to Project managers in the UK. But such IT skills only come from experience. If we do not take on the UK graduates and train them and if we do not offer the lower level jobs to British IT workers, we will never produce the Project managers with 10 years experience that are needed. Indeed, the real worry, after a near decade of neglect in the UK, is that the only new experienced IT workers now come from overseas. So the UK Borders Agency can justifiably say that these are ‘people we need’ without reference to the fact it’s this same policy that has created the skills shortage in the first place!

Your views?
I put this piece on Twitter and Facebook and it has already caused some controversy. Duncan Chapple, who runs Lighthouse Analyst Relations, asked “I wonder how many British IT workers are working abroad?” and Susan Scrupski, who runs Itsinsider in the US commented “many, many of my professional friends are Brits (here in the US)."

I was also sent a link to this article on DailyTech in the US – Microsoft Refuses Senator’s Request to Cut Foreign Workers First. The article highlights that “15 percent of Microsoft's workforce consists of H-1B employees” ie foreign workers in the US on work visas. Microsoft says that it will not cut these – meaning that the recent 5% Microsoft jobs cull will fall entirely on its American employees.

Indeed, my colleague Anthony Miller is eager to post his views on the subject. We’d welcome your comments. Please send to Comments@techmarketview.com and indicate whether or not you are happy for us to publish. 10.25am