The new legislation, which came into force on January 15 of this year, on the one hand, provides for increased fines for employers who hire illegal immigrants, and on the other hand, simplifies the procedure for issuing work permits. 'In one month, the Federal Migration Service registered 108,000 migrants in Moscow alone, and 31,000 people were issued work permits. For now, we issue the relevant documents to everyone who wants them, provided they have not committed offenses and are not wanted,' said Alexey Alexandrov, Chairman of the Committee for Interregional Relations and National Policy of the Moscow City Government. He admitted that permits are currently being issued without regard to the established quota of 6.3 million people from visa-free countries: 'The Ministry of Health and Social Development was supposed to prepare quotas for all regions by the end of December, but we still have not received any figures. And we issue permits based on the fact that Moscow needs no more than 700,000 labor migrants from CIS countries.'
The simplified procedure for issuing work permits may seem liberal and democratic only at first glance. In reality, when drafting this bill back in November last year, the government talked about distributing 6.3 million jobs allocated under the quota among those with skills in short supply in Russia and an appropriate level of qualification. 'In Canada and the United States, where quotas also exist, numerous research centers have been established that constantly monitor the labor market and make long-term forecasts. We have no such structure. It is unclear not only which specialists are needed in which regions, but also where this mysterious figure of 6.3 million came from!' Vladimir Slutsker fumed.
Another problem that regions increasingly face is the emptying of markets and, as a result, a sharp jump in retail prices. According to Alexandrov, in Moscow alone, up to 50% of market stalls emptied on January 15. 'We reserved more than half of the market spaces for domestic producers, but it turns out our rural residents don't like standing behind the counter. We are even thinking about returning to consumer cooperation, otherwise on April 1, when the last migrant disappears from the markets, many of them will have to be closed,' Alexandrov noted.
After listening to other participants of the round table, Vladimir Slutsker got so heated that he even called the adopted migration legislation 'political populism' and urged the government 'to make concrete decisions on its correction as quickly as possible.'
The Moscow government has already prepared its proposals. They include introducing administrative liability for those who rent apartments to illegal immigrants, complicating the selection procedure for foreign workers before issuing them work permits, and concluding agreements with CIS countries on the exchange of labor resources. This package of amendments currently applies only to the capital, but Alexey Alexandrov believes that similar amendments need to be adopted for all regions.