New visa rules of UK will make the overseas hiring difficult.

Due to the new rules introduced into the system by the Home Office and UK Border Agency, it will now get tougher for UK law firms to recruit lawyers from places outside the UK and Europe.

What the latest changes mean is that partners as well as some senior lawyers will now need to acquire a masters degree if they wish to qualify for a working visa under tier one, and in order to grab positions of junior lawyers, which under normal circumstances would fall under tier two visa and would require sponsorship, will now be required to be advertised within the UK.

The recent overhaul of the points-based system, which will apply from the 31st of March, will definitely affect many City firms such as Norton Rose, which has till now been directly recruiting foreign workers from countries like India, Canada and Australia, but now will be forced to publicize any job openings in the JobCentre Plus of the UK.

The changes have been introduced following the scrambling by the firms last year to meet the deadline of November for applying for a license for sponsoring workers from foreign nations. It is however believed that all the ten City firms at the top have now been granted licenses that would enable them to sponsor employees from overseas to work in the UK.

In addition, of the fact that due to the economic downturn most firms have been forced to reduce overseas recruitment, the changes are bound to have a substantial impact of hiring in future as well.

Richard Williams, Denton Wilde Sapte employment lawyer, said that the changes will affect the legal profession in the UK as most of the lawyers currently been permitted to work in the UK under tier one lack a masters’ degree.