I’m not saying that I have definite plans to make the attempt. I’m not saying that I’d want to spend the rest of my life in Ireland or Wales (or England…haven’t been to Scotland). I’m not saying that another country is a panacea to a boring life of employment. I’m just saying that I’d like to get the fuck out of here for a while, and that I was absolutely enchanted by the aforementioned nations.
FTR, I’ve lived in Oregon & L.A., and I doubt an intra-country move will achieve the same effect.
Go back and read the Monkey Mule threads to find out what not to do.
Then again, since you’re a normal human, I don’t think you’ll fall into any of the same problems he did.
IIRC, you work for a town government, so getting a transfer to another location won’t work. I don’t think there is a great need for English teachers in either of those places either. Charities? Except for N. Ireland, I don’t think there’s much room.
Unfortunately, Ireland has recently tightened up its employment laws, to the point where it’s impossible for a non-EEA national to get a work permit here unless you (a) have some really specialised skill like nursing or (b) are willing to do something really awful like working in a mushroom producer’s. I managed to get in here when the work permit laws were fairly lax but I would never be able to now.
There will be a Cabinet reshuffle in the autumn and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment should then no longer be run by the right-wing junior coalition party, so things might improve slightly - but I wouldn’t be too optimistic.
It’s a similar story in England and Wales, you need a work permit for a job and the employer has to prove that you are better qualified than an EU citizen. I got in by being transfered to the UK branch of a US company.
Have you got any (recent) British or Irish relatives? Could you get Canadian passport (if you can and you’re under 26 there’s a scheme).
There is also a huge black economy in the UK (can’t speak for Ireland) that relies on illegal workers (usually on tourist visas), but this is illegal (but not a big deal for you - it’s the emploers that get fined) and the jobs are usually crappy.
What do you do for a living - it could make a huge difference
I think if you have one Irish-born grandparent you can get citizenship.
As ruadh said, it’s difficult, but not impossible, to get work as a non-EU. In the last two years my company has hired a Ukranian, a Norwegian, and an Indian.
You’re in town planning - is that right? A tiny piece of optimism is that the Irish government has recently declared huge numbers of civil servants must move out of Dublin - they’re decentralizing the offices to towns all over Ireland. And lots of the civil servants don’t want to move (especially as they’re not being paid any relocation costs). Of course the whole decentralization process might collapse, especially now the unions have got involved, but in a year or two the upshot of this might be that there are lots of specialized vacancies in the Irish civil service that can’t be filled, and they may start looking overseas.
Here’s a site with vacancies for graduates, so you can see what’s out there.
If you have one UK grandparent, you can apply for the “right of abode”: a four-year visa to live and work in the UK. That might only be for Commonwealthers though…
Be a town planner in Ireland…ha! Interesting career move. You don’t give anyone permission to build as much as a shed in the back garden under any circumstances unless you are related to them or they give you money in a brown envelope. In this case you can give them permission for a huge yellow bungalow slap bang in the middle of a gorgeous view.
There are plenty of non-eu people around. They do the illegal jobs already mentioned, which are mainly crappy. Youth hostels seems to take some of them on as well, which seems marginally less awful, if hardly dreamy. Other busk or study.
That was extremely informative stuff, thanks for digging it up. There does appear to be a huge loophole there with IT professionals/technicians on the list, with no certifying body, anyone can claim to be an IT technician and get a job that claims they’re an IT technician but have been temporarily seconded onto the factory floor. Lest anyone think I’m chasing phantoms, I’ve seen the supporting letters sent out by a company to an individual and was wondering why he was referred to as IT support staff when this was not the case.
Meanwhile back with the OP, most of your potential employers, the local councils and corporations, seem to use this site to advertise for new positions. There seem to be no town planner spots up for grabs at the moment from what I can see but it should give you an idea what they’re looking for. Good luck with your search.
I work for the Irish Government Department responsible for the planning system. A couple of years ago there was a severe shortage of planners (celtic tiger and booming construction industry and all that) and foreign planners were aggressively targetted by Irish local authorities. For some reason, a load of South Africans were recruited. Since then, the output from Irish planning schools has been ramped up massively but there may still be some opportunities for experienced planners. Decentralisation is unlikely to yield up many jobs for planners as our Department only employs a limited number - the vast bulk of the jobs are in local government.
Here’s the place to go for information on public sector vacancies. There’s also plenty of information here on both public and private sector jobs - they may also have some other material of interest as they are the accredited professional body for planners in Ireland.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t describe me. I’m a zoning administrator, which means that I’m the guy charged with enforcing the land-use rules, and I’ve only been doing it for about a year. Education-wise, I’ve got a master’s in econ.; but, all the job I was interested in needed Ph.D.s. (I botched a qualifying exam…) I did do traffic studies for a small city for three years. I’ll definately have to check out the sites offered.
Actually, Norway, though not a part of the EU, is part of the EEC, and its citizens are permitted to take employment in EU countries. The reverse is also true, which is how my ex-wife (UK citizen) will be teaching in Norway soon.