DHAKA: UK visas may be auctioned off to overseas millionaires or ‘sold’ in exchange for donations to hospitals and universities under new government proposals, a media report said Thursday.

The proposals, which will be published next month, will form part of a report from the Government`s Migration Advisory Committee, a report in The Times said, reports The Times of India.

Professor Sir David Metcalf, chairman of the committee, said that it was time for Britain to think a little bit more creatively about the operation of the investor visa route into the country.

‘It may very well be that we should be auctioning some of these slots,’ he was quoted as saying by the daily.

‘There should be proper discussion about it. Equally it may very well be that we should be letting people in if they endow a Cambridge college, a major teaching hospital or the London School of Economics with 10 million pounds,’ he said.

Wealthy foreigners would make offers for a proportion of so-called investor visas, which allow them and their families to live in Britain indefinitely, the report said.

A second option to be outlined in the report is to offer the visas to millionaires who are willing to endow good causes, such as universities, colleges and hospitals, it said.

BDST: 2142 HRS, JAN 09, 2014
Edited by Robab Rosan, Current Affairs Editor