Multiyear work permits for expats bad for locals — Labour Commish

Acting Labour Commissioner Michelle McLean has suggested that multiyear work permits for expatriate workers may put locals at a disadvantage in the workforce.

While acknowledging in a recent virtual stakeholders meeting that there are provisions currently in the labour Code to implement three-year work permits, McLean was hesitant about using this as an across-the-board measure to alleviate the significant backlog faced by her department.

“I think we would have to look at the specific industry… because doing so would place BVIslanders/Belongers at a disadvantage,” McLean said while responding to a resident who proposed for the department to use multiyear permits.

She continued: “You would appoint somebody with a three-year work permit and a BVIslander/Belonger may want to come home, they desire to go into another job and because of that, they are unable to.”

McLean told stakeholders that she felt there couldn’t be a blanket approach to addressing the particular challenge of processing work permits quickly. She said a clause may need to be implemented to somehow push the Labour Department to process permits in a workable timeframe.

Meanwhile, Labour Minister Vincent Wheatley said he was in agreement with the Labour Commissioner on the matter and shared her concerns.