New UK immigration regulations

Under the current arrangements those with a level of English gauged to be below Entry Level 3 on the National Qualifications Framework (benchmarked to B1 on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, CEFR) are entitled to enrol on a course of English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) which includes a citizenship component. If they progress a level, they are judged to have achieved the language and citizenship requirements for settlement, without having to take the electronic test. In 2004, when the proposals for a language and citizenship test were first mooted, the ESOL community fought long and hard for this alternative route for lower level learners.

 

Now, the government will overturn this policy at one stroke. From October 2013 this route will no longer be available and applicants for settlement will have to both pass the citizenship test and provide evidence of passing an English test at intermediate level. The UKBA family migration announcement update 13 June 2012 states:

 

‘from October 2013 … all applicants for settlement [must] pass the Life in the UK Test and present an English language speaking and listening qualification at B1 level or above of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages unless they are exempt.’ http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/newsarticles/2012/june/13-family-migration

See also Home Office Statement of Intent: Family migration (June 2012), in particular paragraphs 113-117: http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/documents/news/soi-fam-mig.pdf

 

The stated aim of the previous government was to encourage people to apply for British citizenship. The new requirements of the current government, however, will actually place settlement in the UK beyond the reach of many would-be applicants, restricting it to those who can read and communicate orally in English to intermediate level. To pass both the Life in the UK test and a speaking and listening exam at B1 on the CEFR is a tall order for those who arrived in the UK with limited English, and perhaps limited literacy in their own expert languages. The Life in the UK test is a multiple choice test that can only be taken in English (or Welsh or Scottish Gaelic), and is taken on a computer. Questions are drawn from one source only, Life in the UK: A Journey to Citizenship (latest edition 2007), which is only available in English. The test is therefore quite transparently one of English literacy and computer skills. Incidentally, the obligation to pass the Life in the UK test is not only an ‘ESOL’ issue: we have interviewed several people from former British colonies in the West Indies and Africa who are not regarded as ‘ESOL’ learners but who have low levels of literacy. These are people from former British colonies who at one time would have been invited as workers to the UK. One Ghanaian woman worked as a carer for the elderly during the day and as a cleaner in Canary Wharf during the night. She paid taxes, her children went to university here and yet she couldn’t pass the test because she couldn’t use a computer or read at the level required.

 

Likewise, passing a speaking and listening exam at B1 on the CEFR (e.g. Cambridge ESOL’s Preliminary English Test, or ESOL Entry Level 3). The ALTE (Association of Language Testers in Europe) ‘can do’ statements for speaking and listening at B1 state: ‘CAN express opinions on abstract/cultural matters in a limited way or offer advice within a known area, and understand instructions or public announcements.’ That probably looks pretty do-able to the average linguistically-naïve politician or civil servant. But how easy or difficult this is to attain depends of course on the individual, their context and their life history. ALTE suggest that B1 level can be reached with around 400 hours of guided instruction (http://www.cambridgeesol.org/about/standards/can-do.html). This may well be realistic for someone who is already literate in their own language and who was able to attain a reasonable level of education prior to migration. Things are very different for someone who, for example, missed out on schooling as a child for some reason, be it war or famine, gender or family matters, or the upheaval of the migration process. Such profiles are familiar to teachers of ESOL. The suggested attainability of a speaking and listening exam pass at level B1 fails to take into account something of a neglected variable in SLA – alphabetic print literacy. Research by Tarone and colleagues, among others, is beginning to demonstrate the benefits of both the experience of schooling and the knowledge of literacy gained as a child on an adult’s ability to develop their second language speaking and listening (see Tarone et al 2009 Literacy and Second Language Oracy. OUP). For many ESOL learners, both schooled experience and L1 literacy are missing. Consequently for many people the bar is now simply too high, and the new language requirements will be unattainable.

 

The government insists that the new requirements are linked to ‘integration’ (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2012/jun/11/theresa-may-deportation-human-rights-live). This government, like the previous one, wilfully conflates an ‘ability to integrate’ with proficiency in the English language. Such a stance denies the multilingual realities of contemporary life, and it is depressing and frustrating to see, yet again, multilingualism presented as a problem. The notion of ‘English = integration’ does not take account of the linguistic and cultural resources held by migrants, resources which may well help, not hinder, their integration into multicultural neighbourhoods. We maintain that the new policy has little to do with integration, however. It is applied differently according to the country of origin and status of individual speakers, and does not apply to EU citizens, whatever their ‘level’ of English. This nails the lie to any claim that the policy is being put in place for the purposes of social cohesion.

 

Access to English is crucial for everyone living in this country – we are not denying that. But if the government were serious about integration, then rather than presenting people with impossible language demands, it would be bending over backwards to provide as a right free and accessible ESOL classes for everyone from the point at which they arrive in the UK. This is a government, however, that says on the one hand that the ‘English Language is the corner-stone of integration’ (Home Office Statement of Intent document June 2012, para 113, p.27), yet on the other can cut funding for ESOL to the core, making it ever more difficult for new arrivals and more established residents alike to gain access to the English language. We would argue that these changes are discriminatory and racist and it is difficult to see them as anything more than a squalid and shameless vote-grasping strategy, which will be to the detriment of the poor and vulnerable. We call on our colleagues in BAAL to join the ESOL community in raising awareness of these changes with MPs, local councillors, community organisations, colleagues and students, and protesting against this policy change in whatever way we can.

 

James Simpson, University of Leeds

Melanie Cooke, King’s College London

 

Resources:

ESOL-Research email list – Active online discussion forum for matters concerning adult ESOL in the UK, managed by James Simpson at the University of Leeds. www.jiscmail.ac.uk/ESOL-Research

Action for ESOL – Pressure group dedicated to resisting the marginalisation of the field of ESOL and cuts to provision. http://actionforesol.org/

NATECLA, the National Association for Teaching English and other Community Languages to Adults, the national professional organisation for ESOL teachers. http://www.natecla.org.uk/