The Office of National Statistics has released its immigration-figures for the year ending in December, prompting the Island’s MP Andrew Turner to issue a statement on the matter.
The new statistics confirm that the Prime Minister is nowhere close to the 2015 Manifesto Pledge to bring down net migration to 100,000. The soaring figures show that net migration rose to 333,000 in 2015, the second highest figure on record. The EU-only net migration also hit record high levels reaching 184,000 last year.
Based on the new statistics, Conservative MPs Michael Gove and Boris Johnson sent a letter asking the Prime Minister to acknowledge a series of facts relating to the free movement of people. The letter points out that a continued membership of the EU means that the Government will fail its repeated promise to bring down net migration.
The Island’s MP, Andrew Turner, commented on the new figures:
“The new figures confirm what we have feared for some time. Immigration is only increasing despite promises of the opposite. This will be the reality for Britain as long as we remain in the EU. In the EU we will never be able to control immigration because that would go against one of its core principles – free movement of people.
“A net migration of 184,000 is almost the equivalent of adding a city the size of Portsmouth to the UK population each year. Britain is an attractive country because of our generous welfare system, including in and out of work benefits, healthcare and education. Many EU nationals come from the Eurozone to avoid the economic crisis in their own home countries. But high immigration brings down wages for British workers and it puts our public services under pressure.
“The emergency brake proposals in the Prime Minister’s renegotiation will not stop migration or give us control of our borders. The only way to take back control is to Vote Leave on the 23rd June. It is unlikely that the situation will get better with countries like Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey on the list to enter the EU. Together they have 88 million citizens that will then acquire the right of free movement.”
Net migration is the difference between the number of people coming to the UK for at least a year and those leaving. The Prime Minister promised to bring down net migration to ‘the tens of thousands’ in both the 2010 and the 2015 Manifestos.
