Lithuania's govt has no plans of liberalizing immigration policies - PM

  • 2018-04-14
  • LETA/TBT Staff

VILNIUS – Lithuania's government has no plans of liberalizing the migration policies, says Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis, adding it was currently well-balanced.

The prime minister spoke in comment of a request by the Lithuanian Industrialists' Confederation, which includes the country's biggest industrial companies, that the government should improve the immigration procedures to facilitate the employment of citizens of third countries in Lithuania.

"We plan no free, uncontrolled and chaotic bringing in of human resources. It will not be like anyone can come here if they want to. We will not encourage this to prevent dumping of salaries," the prime minister told journalists after a joint meeting of the confederation and the government.

"We should let faster registration of companies and speed up the checks of the people. If we plan to have an efficient system here, it should be easier for people from neighboring countries to come here, integrate here and work here," the confederation's president Robertas Dargis said.

Furthermore, the confederation expects lower taxes on employees. The prime minister said this was planned in the proposed revisions of the tax changes to be presented to the public next week.

On Friday, the Lithuanian Industrialists' Confederation made 27 proposals on improvement of the tax and business environment, education quality, management of state resources, bureaucracy and cooperation among businesses and science.