This is not the end of the matter, warns Chair
26 February 2013
On 6 September 2012, the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee published its fourth report of the 2012-13 session, Overseas Students and Net Migration. The Government has today published its response to the Committee's Report
The Committee will meet tomorrow to agree its formal response.
Chair's comments
Commenting, the Committee's Chair, Adrian Bailey MP, said:
"Our Report called for urgent action. The Government replies with a response that is almost four months late. This is not acceptable.
Given the delay, we expected a substantial piece of work. However, the response appears to offer nothing new and manifestly fails to give a clear answer to our key recommendation.
The Committee will now scrutinise the response in detail and agree a formal response tomorrow."
Notes to editors:
It is an established convention that the Government should respond to Committee reports within two months of their publication. The Government response was therefore due on 6 November 2012.
The Committee's report, Overseas Students and Net Migration (PDF, 1.25 MB), recommended that:
"For domestic policy purposes, overseas students should be recorded under a separate classification and not be counted against the overall limit on net migration."