But the committee also recommended graduates should become eligible for intra-company transfers, meaning companies can bring staff in from overseas without having to advertise in the UK.
The proposals would mean graduates would be eligible for transfer into the UK after three months employment at a sponsoring company (compared with 12 months for all other workers). This creates the opportunity for companies to bring in staff from abroad with specific knowledge they would struggle to find in the UK.
According to APSCo, while the intra-company transfer system might not be exploited in the financial and legal sectors, there is evidence it is happening in the IT sector.
APSCo reports early six times as many IT workers entered the UK in 2008 on intra-company transfers than workers in the entire financial and legal sectors combined.
Ann Swain, chief executive of APSCo, said: "The whole point of the intra-company transfer scheme is to bring in senior staff with specialist knowledge or expertise not readily available in the UK. Using the system to bring in graduates would be wrong-headed and illogical. While graduate secondments can be a useful way for companies to train staff, these proposals could lead to a significant increase in non-EU IT graduates coming to the UK at a time when there are plenty of UK IT graduates out of work.
"Most of the non-EU IT workers coming to the UK are working for Indian software companies. India produces enormous numbers of IT graduates every year, so there is a real concern many could head to the UK on intra-company work permits if this proposal is adopted. The irony is that while graduate level IT jobs are being outsourced to India it is now being proposed that it should be easier for Indian IT graduates to work in the UK at a time when there are few if any skill shortages at that level."
