UK to cut jobs for immigrants

The number of occupations available to skilled workers entering the UK from outside the EU will be cut by more than a third under Government plans, a report showed yesterday.

Hairdressers, beauty salon managers and estate agents would all be left out, but nurses, teachers, civil engineers and financial analysts would all still qualify, experts on the Migration Advisory Committee (Mac) said.

Plans to raise the threshold for skilled worker visas to "graduate level" jobs would cut the number of qualifying occupations from 192 to 121, the report said.

The move is part of the Government's pledge to cut net migration.