THE ADMINISTRATION is moving to set a ceiling on the number of non-EU nationals employed on the island, in a bid to halt the influx of illegal workers.
The government plan aims to crack down on the hiring of people not entitled to employment in Cyprus. It is has been prepared by the Ministry of Labour in consultation with the employers’ federation and trade unions, and will be submitted to Cabinet for ratification probably later this month.
Its philosophy is to go to the source – putting the squeeze on employers so that they are deterred from breaking the law.
As it stands, the proposal sets a limit of 6.3 per cent out of the local working population on non-EU foreigners temporarily employed in Cyprus. This includes the housemaid profession.
A new maximum will be implemented for 2008.
Under the plan, employers will be slapped with heavy fines for each instance in which they are found to be hiring illegal aliens. In addition, a register will be created, into which the names of wayward employers will be entered. Employers who are found to have broken the law and who are blacklisted will face a number of sanctions.
For example, they will be denied future applications to hire foreign staff, and will lose the right to bid for state tenders.
Moreover, for any application with the Land Registry Department to be processed, they must first settle their social insurance arrears.
And from now on, non-EU foreigners looking for a job in Cyprus must spell out the precise nature of their intended employment, and they must file their application before they arrive on the island.
What’s more, the percentage of non-EU nationals in any one business must not exceed 30 per cent.
But it is not all limitations and punitive measures. The government proposal also gives incentives to businesses that play by the rules. Priority to hire non-EU nationals will be granted to organisations where Cypriots comprise the majority of the staff, or businessmen who participate in employee retraining programmes.
“We’re aiming at a targeted hiring of foreigners – that’s the best way to describe it,” Labour Minister Antonis Vasileiou explained.
He said the government wanted “better regulation of the labour market – businessmen must justify why they are bringing in people, tell us what they will be doing and for how long.”
It is estimated that foreign nationals currently make up 15 per cent of the total workforce, although this figure does include EU citizens.
According to official statistics, in 1999 the number of foreign workers was at a low 24,000, but this rocketed to 56,000 by 2005. Last year the number reached 60,000.
One of the government’s main concerns is that most of the non-EU nationals have low-tier jobs that do not contribute to the country’s GDP or development of R&D programmes.
Late last year, the government said it would be opening its labour market to Bulgarians and Romanians without restrictions. Bulgaria and Romania joined the European Union on January 1
Cyprus decided to go for the open-doors policy, even though several other EU member states, notably Britain and Ireland, had reversed their open-door policy in the wake of an influx of Polish and other former Eastern bloc country workers after they joined the EU in 2004.
Unions say the drawback of an open-door policy is that the foreign workers are paid less than domestic workers, which causes wages to plummet, not to mention adverse effects on unemployment.
Nicos Moiseos, general secretary of right-wing union SEK, told the Mail that they had always advocated a ceiling on foreign workers.
Broadly speaking, SEK is in favour of the proposal drafted by the Labour Ministry, but will wait for the final draft to make any comments.
For their part, the Employers and Industrialists Federation (OEV) said they had many objections to the plan, which they would reveal in the coming days.
According to Michalis Antoniou, director of the industrial relations department at OEV, the 30 per cent quota on businesses is “inexplicable”.
“This will stifle companies wishing to expand. If you want to hire foreign workers for a specific task – which may be highly technical or specialised – but are told you’ve already reached your quota, then how are you supposed to make any business plans?”
