French interior minister Claude Guéant has finally issued official instructions loosening his crackdown on the number of residency and work permits granted to non-European Union foreign students in France. The backtrack followed vigorous opposition to the measures, announced last May, from the country’s academic and business organizations.
A circular sent by Guéant on May 31st 2011 to the government’s regional administrative authorities, the préfectures, ordered a "rigorous" crackdown on the numbers of residency and work permits delivered to foreign students who are not nationals of European Union (EU) member states, and to limit the period non-EU foreign graduates can stay in the country to six months.
The May 31st missive also tightened restrictions on the delivery of work permits to non-EU foreign nationals in general. "The government has made its objective that of adapting legal immigration to the needs of French society, as also to its capacity of reception and integration," the circular began, referring to "one of the most severe economic crises in history".
A group of foreign students in France set up a ‘May 31 Collective', Collectif du 31 mai, in opposition to the circular and which offers advice and practical help to students applying for a permit. Its website argues that, via the circular, the French government was sending a "message" akin to the slogans of the Far-Right Front National party, citing "National preference" and "France for the French".
There are some 300,000 foreign students in French higher education establishments. In an international ranking, this is the third largest number of foreign nationals studying in a host country, after the US and the UK.
Following a meeting earlier this month with representatives of France’s higher education authorities - including French university presidents, the managements of higher education schools and the directors of French engineering schools – the government accepted a loosening of the instructions which in particular created difficulties for foreign graduates seeking to change their residency status from that of student to employee.
A new circular was sent to the country’s préfectures on Thursday, containing clarifications concerning existing legislation and advising a less strict interpretation of some of its detail. It is jointly signed by interior minister Guéant, higher education and research minister Laurent Wauquiez and labour minister Xavier Bertrand (click on the 'Prolonger' tab top-of-page to see the full text, in French).
It calls on the local administrative authorities to “put into action the purview of Article L.311-11 of the Ceseda”, referring to legislation regarding the entry and stay of immigrants on French territory. This article of the legislation, drawn up in 2006 by then-interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy, authorizes the delivery of a temporary six-month residency permit to those applicants who have educational qualifications that are equal to, or higher than, a master’s degree.
The new circular underlines that a person granted a six-month residency permit should be allowed to seek and exercise a job that is “in relation with their training and which is paid more than a level established by decree”. If, at the end of the six months, the person finds employment, or receives an employer’s engagement to hire them, they cannot be refused their continued stay in France for reasons of employment.
An applicant’s request for a residency permit should be considered valid even if they have been recruited or have received a promise of recruitment “before the delivery of their diploma” it adds.
No mention of those already expelled
As demanded by higher education heads, the new circular makes clear that “to facilitate” the study of applications for a residency permit “the qualified students may present, to support their request for a residency permit for an initial professional experience, an attestation jointly established by the director or president of the higher education establishment and the company head certifying that the conditions laid out by Article L.311-11 are respected, notably concerning the appropriateness of the diploma with regard to the offered employment, in terms of the level of qualification or field [of work].”
A residency permit can be renewed “up to the end of the initial professional experience” if the conditions upon which it was granted “are still met”.
Concerning the granting of a change in status of the residency permit from that of a student to that of an employed person, the decision will remain an arbitrary one. However, the new circular demands that prefects examine them “with discernment” to ensure that “the necessary control of professional immigration is not carried out to the detriment of the attractiveness of the French higher education system, nor the needs of our companies for specific high-level skills.”
“The in-depth knowledge of a foreign country, civilization, language or culture can thus constitute a specific competence sought by some of our companies, for example in order to succeed within a new market.”
It then lists a series of “situations” which the local authorities must “take into account” during their consideration of individual applications. These include giving favourable consideration to those that have the support of companies that have “an establishment or interests in the foreign applicant’s country of origin, geographical or cultural zone”. Another important element, it instructs, is the applicant’s “level of studies and the results obtained”. Those applicants who have studied abroad in a French higher education establishment, or one with contractual links to an establishment in France, are to be given special consideration.
“These examples are neither limited nor cumulative” adds the new circular. Confirming a pledge by the interior minister during a press conference on January 10th, it orders a re-examination of all applications made since June 1st 2011 – i.e. those submitted since the initial circular was sent out on May 31st – and that no order since given to rejected applicants to leave France would be executed before the result of the reappraisals.
However, there was no mention of the status of those upon whom an order to leave the country (1) had already been executed.
-------------------------
1: Officially termed as an 'Obligation de quitter le territoire français' (OQTF)
-------------------------
English version by Graham Tearse