With several big construction projects under way in Britain,
the multinational company CH2M Hill spent six months searching for a
qualified tunneling engineer.
5
IDON — With
LONDON
2 Only a few weeks ago did the company find a candidate, in Portugal. CH2M
no visa or work permits were
Hill quickly made plans to bring him north
required, thanks to a European Union policy that allows the free flow of labor
across the borders of the 27-country bloc.
CD
3 With signs that Britain might seek an exit from the European Union,
businesses like CH2M Hill are starting to focus on what they might lose in the
10 labor force if the country does leave.
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4 For non-Europeans, securing a work permit can take three months, so
the labor law is a huge help, said Michael I. Glenn, CH2M Hill's director of
international operations. "These programs and projects that we do are of a scale
that we have to move our expertise around," he said.