Migration figures expected to shatter Cameron's 'tens of thousands' pledge
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Version 0 of 1. Net migration to Britain is now higher than it was when David Cameron took office despite his “no ifs, not buts” promise to cut it to “tens of thousands” by this May’s general election, new official figures are expected to show on Thursday. The last set of quarterly migration figures before the general election are now widely expected to show that Cameron and the home secretary, Theresa May, have spectacularly missed their politically sensitive target to reduce net migration below 100,000 by this May. The figures to be published on Thursday are now expected to show that it has actually risen above its original level of 244,000 when they took office in May 2010 and promised to cut it by more than 60%. The previous set of quarterly figures published in November by the Office for National Statistics figures put net migration to Britain in the previous 12 months at 260,000 – the highest level since the last general election. The net migration figure represents the flow of people coming to live in Britain for more than 12 months minus the flow of people leaving Britain to live abroad for more than 12 months. The government’s migration advisory committee said on Wednesday that before 2012 net emigration of British citizens effectively cancelled out net immigration from the rest of the European Union. “However the constant rate of British net migration alongside the continued rise of EU net migration has meant that total net migration can now be attributed to both EU and non-EU nationals,” said the official Home Office migration advisory committee in its latest report on shortage occupations. “Non-EU migration, despite having fallen in recent years, has risen to 143,000 in 2013 and still accounts for a greater share of net immigration.” The Oxford University-based Migration Observatory recently criticised claims from ministers that the reason they missed the target was increased EU net migration. “Policies have failed to reduce net migration from outside the EU to less than 100,000 at any time over the course of this parliament, meaning that the target would have been missed with or without any rise in EU migration,” the Oxford migration experts said. A Labour party spokesperson said the figures would show that May’s immigration policy was in chaos: “Her net migration target is in tatters, illegal immigration and exploitation are getting worse, she’s given citizenship to serious criminals and the only answer she can come up with is a few more restrictions on the overseas university students who bring billions of pounds of investment into Britain.” Don Flynn, director of the Migrants Rights Network, said the latest figures “reflected Britain’s growing economy and should not be used by the political parties as a launch-pad for their negative political campaigns shifting the blame for wider problems on to migrants”. “What these numbers show that Britain is more than ever an outward-facing, globalised country with a diverse and hardworking population from overseas. However, we fear that the political debate ahead of the general election will fail to reflect that contemporary reality in any meaningful way,” said Flynn. |