Portugal was during many years an emigration country. Today it is an immigration country.
The great public works would stop if one would take away the thousands of African, Russian, Ukrainian, Romanian, and Moldavian workers -among others - who work clandestinely to the Portuguese companies. The number of illegal workers who live and work in Portugal is not known. Some talk of 30.000 while others say it might be close to 80.000.
The Government recognized the need to replace the present Immigration Law, which is extremely restrictive, by a more open Law, that would allow farmers and industrial corporations to recruit foreign workers and legalize their stay in Portugal.
The European Union has also announced the intention of presenting an European Charter of the Immigrant as well as to define a status for immigrated workers.
There are principles that do not generate much discussion: that an equal job requires an equal salary, that there should be an equality in social protection (and in the social security discounts) and that there should be an equality in taxation.
The Present situation of the illegal workers has lead the State to loose millions of escudos in taxes and the social security to receive nothing from many of the workers that labor in Portugal.
It is therefore predictable that the upcoming licensing of immigration will be very strict in several aspects, from the pre-establishment of a labor contract and the imposition of rules in what concerns qualifications, to the verification of the candidate's criminal records.
Portugal is a pacific country but there has been a growing concern about the safety of its citizens. It is predictable that the new laws will be very strict in the imposition of selective measures to try to avoid insecurity situations.
The delicacy of some of these situations as well as the conflict of this issue with the problem of fundamental rights, justifies the intervention of lawyers in this field. On the other hand, the appearance of new communities of immigrants originates new problems in several domains, namely in what concerns Family Law and Succession Law.
Besides giving a special attention to Immigration Law by assisting foreign citizens themselves as well as the companies that employ them, we pay close attention to the new topics of Private International Law that this issue brings up. We therefore establish partnerships with Lawyers from the countries where the immigrants originate from as we come across the concrete issues to resolve. For now, considering the growing importance of the Slavic communities, we have the collaboration of Russian interpreters to assist clients who are not familiar with the Portuguese, French or English languages.