The High Court has ruled that the government’s revised terms and conditions for their Highly Skilled Migrants Programme (HSMP) were not fair. Judges at the High Court hearing said it was "not open to the government to alter the terms and conditions" of the Highly Skilled Migrants Programme, which was developed to allow talented migrants to seek employment with UK businesses.



The issue was taken to court when the Highly Skilled Migrants Programme Forum filed a revision petition to oppose the retrospective changes made to the terms and conditions of the programme back in November 2006. The scheme was initially introduced in 2002, but the government wanted to tighten up certain conditions of entry. In deciding to take this case to court, the Forum was acting on behalf of 49,000 highly skilled workers, including many doctors, engineers and technocrats from India who were attracted to the UK by the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme and who stood to miss out if the changes to the terms and conditions of the programme were allowed. These migrants told the judge that they may fail to have their visa renewed if changes to the scheme were to go ahead, and a number of them also made official statements to the judge that indicated the hardships they would face if the changes to these terms and conditions were permitted.

The points of the scheme that the government tried to revise were qualifications, current salary, age, UK Experience, and UK Study. These changes meant that anybody who currently held a visa under the scheme would be forced to meet again with immigration officials for re-examination under the new scheme. The new scheme meant that migrants had to demonstrate a higher annual income in order to get their visa extended. However, the Forum claimed that many migrants would be unable to do this and, as a result, up to 90% of the 49,000 migrants who have come to the UK under the scheme may be forced to leave the country.

After hearing the evidence, the High Court judge said that the government’s changes to the terms and conditions of the Highly Skilled Migrant Programme were 'unfair', particularly to the immigrants who had already been granted UK visas under the old terms and conditions.