Ryanair's Michael O'Leary wants 'practical' immigration approach

Ryanair boss Michael O'Leary has urged the government to take a more "practical, common sense" approach to post-Brexit policy, to allow more workers from Europe to fill vacancies. O'Leary said he could hire people from continental Europe for jobs that he cannot fill with British workers, but is unable to get visas for them. Facilitating such visas would help ease disruption to air travel, he said. The government said it wanted firms to invest in workers from the UK. O'Leary said: "I can hire thousands of people in Portugal, in Italy, France, Germany at exactly the same wages that I'm paying in the UK and I just can't hire them in the UK at the moment. And we have this bizarre situation at the moment that in the UK I can get visas to bring Moroccans to come in and work as cabin crew. But I can't get visas for Portuguese or Italians or Slovakian youngsters. We just need a bit of more common sense and a practical approach to how we implement Brexit," he told BBC Radio 4. He said enabling such visas would help ease the disruption currently being felt at some airports, and ease skill shortages in other areas. "There are not enough people in the UK willing to do these jobs… particularly during peak periods of the summer and airports in particular. Airport handling staff and airport security staff are really struggling to recruit, particularly in the southeast, at airports like Gatwick, Heathrow and Manchester."<br/>