Human rights lawyers condemn English tests for spouses coming to UK

[Bassman62]

his Malaysian employers had paid us a fortune to send him here.

 

We all keep hearing about these mythical sums of money bandied around but never how much these mythical sums amount to.

[Rupert_Baehr]

In the early 80's I worked with a Malaysian guy who was in the UK doing his PhD, at first his English was very mediocre, but he always had his English phrasebook with him and asked us to test him on it..I got quite fed up helping him conjugate "hello, where can I catch the 52 from?", by the end of his first year his English was fluent, albeit heavily accented and more importantly his Malaysian employers had paid us a fortune to send him here.

 

I too worked with a Malaysian student on a postgraduate course. He stayed for a few months (didn't finish it.) It turned out (he admitted to his fellow students) that the reason he had enrolled to do the course because he could get an educational visa and he'd been denied a work visa. - The real reason he was in the UK was to negotiate business for his company (an oil company) with a firm in Northern Ireland.

 

Once he'd finished the negotiations, he gave up the course and went back to Malaysia. - It would've made more sense to give him the visa he needed in the first place.

 

According to both the previous government and various people in this one, educational visas are prone to abuse. Students enrol on non-existent courses get a visa, come to the country and disappear. Possibly a major reason why the government want people to learn English before they get here.

 

so what you saying we should reduce the fees for foreign students :huh:i think they come here for the education they receive which must be good otherwise they would go elsewhere .

 

Non-EU students pay more than EU students because Universities (or rather the government) do provide some subsidies for EU students. - The aim is to assist UK students, but EU law requires that all EU states treat all citizens of all other EU states in the same manner as they treat their own, so all EU students pay the same price.

 

They are not any other business they are payed for out of our taxes, you'll be justifying patients having to pay for their hospital treatment next.

 

They may (and probably do) receive some money from your taxes, but Universities generate a significant part of their funding from foreign students (as well as from research grants.)

 

Non-EU foreign patients (those who are not entitled to free treatment under the NHS) are expected to pay for their own hospital treatment. - Though it seems many don't do so.

 

To take that to its logical conclusion you'll be asking parents to pay for primary, junior and secondary school tuition next.

 

They do that already. Either through their taxes or - if they elect to educate to educate their children privately - through their taxes AND direct to the school.

 

A while ago I said prisoners should be made to work whilst in jail, I got the same response over that and look what one of the lates proposals is regarding prisoners working

The problem for you is that I'm always one step ahead of you.

 

It will be interesting to see how Ken Clarke's proposal works out.

 

Mrs Beeton's famous recipe for Jugged Hare begins with the words: "First catch your Hare."

 

Consider a prison with 700 inmates. Some inmates must be segregated from others, so there are logistical problems in moving groups of prisoners around. It takes time to get prisoners up in the morning, to get them fed and to get them to work. It takes time to move them around at lunchtime, more time to get them to work in the afternoon and yet more time to get them back to their own wing after work.

 

How many prison officers + admin staff + lecturers/trainers do you think you would need to operate a prison where the inmates are out of their cells for 15 hours a day (and in them for 9)?

 

How does that compare with the number you would need if the inmates were in their cells for 20 (or more) hours a day?

 

Ken Clarke wants prisoners to work a 40-hour week. Working an 8-hour day (with mealtimes) would probably take 13-14 hours. On top of that, the inmates would need some time out of their cells for 'association', time to exchange laundry, time to queue to use the phone, time for library visits and time for other administrative tasks.

 

I taught in a prison for about 4 years. My students got up at 7am, arrived in the classroom just before 9am, went for lunch at midday, came back at 2 pm and left at about 4.00. They received their evening meal at 5pm (AFAIK.)

 

So a full 'work' day - 7am to 5pm - gave time for 5 hours of classes.

 

There were other groups doing carpentry, plastering, bricklaying and engine repair courses and a group working on plastic recycling. Each of those groups spent 5 hours a day working.

 

If you want to extend that to 8 hours a day and you will be feeding them at 8pm. You are going to need more staff. More teachers, more instructors and more prison officers. Manpower costs are a significant expense in running a prison.

 

When in-cell televisions were introduced, they weren't universally popular. The smarter (or perhaps more cynical) inmates realised that (a) The TV was another means of control (the TV could be taken away for misbehaviour) and (b) if inmates had a TV in their cell, they could be locked up earlier. Te introduction of in-cell TVs (for which the inmates each paid 50p per week - about 10% of their income at that time) gave rise to significant reductions in manpower costs.

 

You need a lot of prison officers when inmates are not in their cells - supervising them is labour-intensive. (Similarly the requirement for close supervision dictates that work groups and classes are small.) The number of supervisors in a prison factory is probably going to be considerably higher than the number of supervisors in a factory down town.

 

Once the prisoners are 'banged up behind their doors' the number of staff required drops dramatically. If he is going to introduce 40 hour work weeks for prisoners, then I hope Mr Clarke has very deep pockets indeed. - Manpower costs in prisons will go through the roof. He won't be able to pay the additional costs out of a reduced budget.

 

Who is going to run the prison factories and additional classes? - Presumably the government will try to 'contract out' the business. I've no doubt they will manage to obtain contractors and no doubt they will be quite happy to vet all the employees of those contractors. It is possible to operate prison factories and it is possible to produce high-quality merchandise in those factories. Merchandise which will compete directly with that produced by companies 'on the out'.

 

Mr Clarke said (echoing many of his predecessors) "Many prisoners will find it difficult to get employment when they are released because they lack the skills necessary to get and keep a job."

 

That's quite true. - But as one inmate said to me: "Lack of skills makes getting a job very difficult - but having a prison record makes it practically impossible."

[ricgem2002]

Is it Ok to knock someone's point of view because it is wrong and just happens to be different from one's own?

well you seem to do it a lot so what do you think

[boyfriday]

whos trying to bait you bf i enjoy our discussions, but dont knock other people about their views as being wrong just because they dont agree with your biased view.

The baiting is obvious since your claiming things I haven't said.

looking for the earlier thread when someone pulled you up on it has now disapeared . ( i wonder why)

You don't have to look too far to find threads where my views are challenged robustly, but you're misguided doing it on this thread, since I'm all for getting as much as we can from foreign students, and contrary to the perception, I agree with pre entry English tests.

[boyfriday]

We all keep hearing about these mythical sums of money bandied around but never how much these mythical sums amount to.

 

It doesn't matter what they are, provided they cover the full costs of their education, but since you ask here's a table of costs for the 2007/08 academic year:

 

http://www.ukstudentlife.com/Prepare/Cost.htm#CourseCosts

 

Average postgraduate tuition fees are £10,900pa, and average living costs estimated at £9000pa, so that's up to £19,900pa that each of those 7000 international students in Sheffield brings into our economy every year-£139,300,000..do you think Sheffield can afford to lose foreign students?

[boyfriday]

According to both the previous government and various people in this one, educational visas are prone to abuse. Students enrol on non-existent courses get a visa, come to the country and disappear. Possibly a major reason why the government want people to learn English before they get here.

 

Well it's quite easy to check the validity of courses that students enrol on and the credibility of students coming to study here, and I believe that's something the government are addressing.

[Bassman62]

I

It will be interesting to see how Ken Clarke's proposal works out.

 

Mrs Beeton's famous recipe for Jugged Hare begins with the words: "First catch your Hare."

 

As with everything else you'll always get some person with the "my glass is half empty attitude", full of negatives Ah but this and Ah but that.

If everyone had that attitude we'd still be rubbing two sticks together to start fires.

Much of the time you have to ask about the ulterior motives of these Ah but merchants.

[Bassman62]

Originally Posted by Bassman62

To take that to its logical conclusion you'll be asking parents to pay for primary, junior and secondary school tuition next.

 

Quote:

They do that already. Either through their taxes or - if they elect to educate to educate their children privately - through their taxes AND direct to the school.

 

And they also do that for further education.

But, acording to your logic someone whose children stay on for 'A' levels should pay more tax for the 'A' level studies than someone whose children have left school and taken employment, after all 'A' levels are the means to gain entry to most universities.

[boyfriday]

You mean like Ken Clarke, with his "what if we make the prisoners work" proposal? Or do you mean the "what if" merchants who disagree with your world-view only?

 

In reality of course, the "what if" merchants are the people who invent and discover EVERYTHING -

 

"what if" i fly this kite in an electrical storm

"what if" animals change over time from less complicated creatures into more complex creatures

"what if" I hit this animal and then kill it and eat it.

 

If it were not for "what if merchants", we would not even have reached the stage of rubbing two sticks together to make fire!

 

..back of the net!

[Mecky]

Well it's quite easy to check the validity of courses that students enrol on and the credibility of students coming to study here, and I believe that's something the government are addressing.

 

No it isn't, lots of college refuse point blank to verify student status or qualifications.