 party warning it amounted to a 'campaign to legalise illegal immigration'. But Olivier Dussopt, the Labour Minister, said: 'RN cannot claim we're stealing jobs from the French because we're talking about posts that are already filled by workers who are illegally in France precisely because they had remained vacant.' Other draft measures in a bill to be voted on early next year include automatic renewal of residency for some of those holding long-term residency permits, and the right for bona fide asylum seekers to work upon arrival rather than wait six months under current rules. The ministers also pledged to speed up the expulsion of illegal immigrants ordered to leave France, a process which can take as long as two years. Last year only 1){kind=link}
The country is struggling to fill around 400,000 job vacancies, most notably in the construction industry
France wants to grant residency permits to illegal migrants working in sectors “under strain” as it struggles to fill some 400,000 job vacancies in key industries.
Widespread labour shortages have hit France’s construction sector particularly hard, but without a majority in parliament, the centrist government needs to convince other political forces to back their plan to make it easier for illegal migrants to obtain residency permits.
In an interview with Le Monde, Gerald Darmanin, the interior minister, said: “If a foreigner illegally in France says ‘I want to work in a profession under strain’, the labour minister is proposing to create a ‘profession under strain’ residency permit to be defined. So he will have adequate social protection.”
“Perhaps we don’t give enough residency permits to people who work and who certain bosses use as a reserve army of labour – as Marx would have put it,” said Mr Darmanin.