The UK is facing a grave threat: the dramatic decline in the number of curry houses. The culprit: new immigration rules that exclude skilled curry chefs from Asia. According to the Financial Times:

The problem for restaurateurs is that most of their new chefs come to the UK on sponsored visas from Bangladesh. That has been tougher since 2006, they say, and will get tougher still when the new system takes effect in November. It will count for naught that a would-be immigrant can mix a mean masala. He will need fluent English and a high-level cooking certificate too.

The government has suggested that curry houses should employ east Europeans, who need no such qualifications. “We tried that, but it didn’t work,” said restaurateur Abdul Latif, glumly watching his depleted kitchen staff at work at his Black Country establishment. He added: “We had an east European sous chef, but his chapattis were wiggly at the edges, like maps of Russia.” In addition, it transpired that east European economic migrants spoke a different variety of broken English to Bangladeshi ones.

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