Don’t let immigration rules stifle short-term mobility
There’s a consensus on the long-term benefits of researcher mobility. Now, data on conferences show the importance of short-term mobility to UK science, writes Jo Reynolds, in Research Professional*.
Issues around permanent residence have grabbed the headlines since the Brexit vote. But for the health of science, researchers need to be mobile on a range of timescales, from settling in another country permanently, to working somewhere for years, months or days.
Conferences in particular are the engine rooms of science, vital for exchanging ideas, forming relationships and building careers. And as an organisation that is committed to advancing the chemical sciences through the exchange of ideas, we know that they are truly international.
The Royal Society of Chemistry runs a series of major international chemistry conferences every year, bringing together everyone from postgraduates to Nobel prizewinners. We recently analysed attendance at these between 2015 and 2017. The data form part of our submission to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee’s ongoing inquiry into an immigration system that works for science and innovation.
The attendee profile shows the importance of short-term international mobility for science. More than half of all delegates, and 60 per cent of the abstracts accepted for presentation, came from outside the UK.
One event, the 13th International Conference on Materials Chemistry, held in Liverpool in July 2017, brought together 568 delegates from 44 countries. The researchers who gave the 30 plenary talks—who tend to be the most eminent—worked in 11 different countries including China, India, the Netherlands and Switzerland.
This analysis sheds new light on the importance of short-term international mobility to chemistry. The same surely applies to many other disciplines.
The UK is a major partner in a global network that fosters collaborations in research, teaching and innovation, through conferences and networks. Such events contribute to the UK’s reputation in its areas of research strength. Yet even before Brexit actually happens, immigration policy is making it harder for the UK to continue playing this convening role in international research.
We know of several instances of researchers coming from outside the European Economic Area who were not able to attend chemistry conferences because their visa applications were turned down or not processed in time. Media reports going back several years suggest that this problem is not unique to chemistry conferences.
Their true number is difficult to gauge, as it is challenging to collect data on this issue, but such cases surely contribute to a perception of the UK as being unwelcoming to international researchers. We are working to find the extent and causes of the issue, as part of our ongoing evidence gathering on immigration and science.
The UK’s future immigration system must enable both long-term and short-term mobility of scientists. It must include a light-touch, fast system allowing scientists to travel to the UK for short, work-related visits.
Science will have the most benefit to humanity if people across the world meet to exchange ideas. The government must work closely with researchers to design an immigration system that works for science.
*This article also appeared in Research Fortnight
In the two years since the Brexit referendum, mobility of researchers has been a dominant concern for the science and innovation community. We know that the ability to travel to, live in and bring your family to another country is an important part of scientists’ careers across academia and industry.
Researchers have spoken with one voice to stress that the flexible movement of people is essential for science to advance. In May, for example, the Royal Society of Chemistry was one of 50 organisations from across Europe that signed the Future Partnership Project statement, making clear the need to avoid barriers to the movement of scientists between the UK and the European Union.