Latest immigration stats released & they are gigantic again

[BritBrit]

The final immigration stats from the ONS before the EU referendum have been released with immigration for 2015 at 630,000.

-630,000 immigrants came to the UK
-Net immigration was 333,000 up 20,000
-EU immigration was 270,000
-Romanian & Bulgarian immigration tripled in 2015
-42% of EU immigrants did not have a job when coming to the UK
-EU immigrants took more new British jobs (224,000) than British workers (185,000)

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/internationalmigration/bulletins/migrationstatisticsquarterlyreport/may2016

I think everyone will loose in the short term. Its the nature of the beast of uncertainty. There is no getting away from it

we have already lost out, we lost out during CC, we lost out due to Blairs decision to lift workers rights, short term loss to get back some semblance of control is fine with me.

I have witnessed, seen, tasted and lived mass immigration and its not for me. I don't want it for my DD's.

Its worth the gamble to have a far better quality of life, and democracy.

Well we have this chance, one chance, one chance only, of getting control of our country and immigration again

Subject to us not dealing with Europe - freedom of movement from what I see is non negotiable. So it wont make any difference to immigration we just wont be able to veto new members.

what can you see Dad, I would love to know which shop you got your Crystal ball from.

Not a crystal ball lol but based on previous deals with other coutries and incompetence of Tories and Nu-labour types when trying to get deals.

So you say we will get a deal from Europe that doesn't include freedom of movement? why would Europe want to do that?

Breaking77 & Motheroffourdragons the UK is in a very powerful position to negotiate a unique UK-EU deal. We are the EU's biggest export market, the trade deficit is also running at almost £100 billion a year in the EU's favour (it was £23 billion Jan -Mar 2016) & also the EU has free trade deals with many nations that do not involve free movement or any EU fees e.g. Turkey, Mexico, South Korea etc

The reason I am voting leave is because I don't see the EU as a democratic institution.
I don't believe that our own democracy is much hat either but at least there might be a chance of improving it.
If we stay in the EU, we will be giving away our sovereignty. And will be controlled by a none democratic body.

ive just walked past a car full of migrants who were whistling, shouting obscene things and asking me to get in and have some fun

with my 7 year old son

if leaving means we have some form of controllibg these filth bags then im all for it

www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/treasury-committee/news-parliament-2015/eu-referendum-report-16-17/

This is well worth a read. (Click on the first link to get from the summary about the report to the report itself. Its well pointed and relevantly easy to read).

The Report is cross party / cross leave and remain but it was still agreed unanimously.

It is purely about the economic debate, not other issues.

It is critical of the Leave and Remain campaigns and is critical of the Treasury itself in using misleading information to persuade voters.

Which in itself is all very refreshing.

Not really understanding how the Romanian man is entitled to housing and benefits. I thought this only kicked in after 3 years and after contributing first. It is bonkers. People in the UK should come first. How many times is this being repeated up and down the UK.

Whereas in the E u gives such generous housing.

I agree the EU should alleviate the poverty within the countries as a joint effort to stop people coming to our small island. Sometimes the immigrants build houses at home so why should they take our social housing here.

There is a real problem with our own indigenous young people being able to afford to have a family after being saddled with student debt, expensive housing. Why shouldn't they get the affordable housing.

Commons Report linked above. Comments on migration and welfare:

125.In a speech on 10 November 2015, the same day that he wrote to Donald Tusk setting out the Government’s renegotiation objectives, the Prime Minister said that he wanted “to reduce the current very high level of migration from within the EU into the UK”. He went on to say that this would be achieved in part by seeking changes that reduced the “pull factor” of the UK’s welfare system:

we have proposed that people coming to Britain from the EU must live here and contribute for 4 years before they qualify for in work benefits or social housing. And that we should end the practice of sending child benefit overseas.

126.In evidence to the Committee, the Chancellor was asked about the extent to which these restrictions would limit inward migration from the EU and contribute to the Government’s target to reduce migration to the “tens of thousands”. He said:

Our assessment is that that would be an effective mechanism for making the UK less attractive to people coming to this country to claim more generous benefits and that being their primary motive. There is quite a lot of evidence that, for some migrants, that is the principal draw. [ … ] there is of course also non-EU migration and things like the family route, but this would help a lot in delivering the target.

127.In support of his argument that the restrictions would have an effect on migration, the Chancellor cited Open Europe analysis, published in November 2014, that demonstrated a “financial incentive” for workers in Spain, Poland and Bulgaria to migrate to the UK, because what they could expect to earn on the minimum wage in their own country was less than what could be earned in the UK, taking into account the national minimum wage and in-work benefit entitlement. On this basis, Open Europe advocated a policy similar to that which the Government sought in its negotiations; there should be a “qualification period” for access to in-work benefits and other parts of the welfare system.

128.The Chancellor was also asked whether the introduction of the national living wage (announced in the July 2015 Budget), which will result in the minimum wage for over 25s rising at a faster rate, reaching £9 per hour by 2020, might offset any effects from the proposed in-work benefit restrictions. He said that he “[did] not think that the national living wage is fundamentally going to change the attractiveness of the UK to overseas workers”. In evidence to the Committee on the Autumn Statement 2015, Sir Stephen Nickell, member of the Budget Responsibility Committee, disagreed with the Chancellor about the impact of the proposed in-work benefit restrictions. He said that, in his view, they would have “not much” impact on inward EU migration.

129.The settlement that emerged on 19 February differed from the Prime Minister’s demands. Instead of an outright four-year ban on in-work benefits for EU migrants, new migrants will qualify for them on a “graduated” basis over a period of four years. And instead of a ban on child benefit paid in respect of children living in migrants’ home countries, the value of benefits paid will reflect “conditions” in the country in question.

130.In support of proposed restrictions, both the Prime Minister and the Chancellor made use of a figure of 40 per cent to refer to the proportion of EEA migrants supported by the “UK benefits system”.113 In an effort to verify that figure, and to determine what proportion of migrants might be affected by the in-work benefits restrictions, the Committee obtained, through correspondence with HMRC, the following numbers:
◾The number of EEA migrants who had arrived within the four years to 2013/14, and who were in households claiming tax credits in 2013/14 was 111,000
◾The number of EEA migrants subject to income tax, NICs and/or who had received HMRC benefits at some point in 2013/14, and who had arrived in the previous four years, was 1 million.

131.The figures indicate that, were the in-work benefit restrictions in force in 2013/14, 11 per cent of EU migrants would have been living in households that might have been affected by them. This is consistent with work by the Oxford University Migration Observatory, which concluded that, based on publicly-available data, “roughly 10-20 per cent of recently arrived EU adults were receiving tax credits in early 2014”.

132. Outside the EU, the UK would be able to impose controls on EU migration. Michael Dougan, Professor of European Law at Liverpool Law School, said that “In principle, after withdrawal, the UK will no longer be bound by any free movement”. However, as discussed in Chapter 5, doing so could have implications for the access it is able to secure to EU goods and services markets. Boris Johnson told the Committee that, on leaving, “we would take back control over our borders”, adding that “both of those would be locked off–free movement and budgetary contributions–but it would be massively in the interests of our partners to do a deal based on free trade in goods and services, and I am sure that is what we would achieve”.

133.In written evidence to the Committee, the Civil Engineering Contractors Association (CECA) said that Brexit and new migration controls could risk the loss of key skills.

134.A variety of studies have suggested that EU immigration has had a net positive fiscal impact.

135.Some campaigners for Brexit have said that Brexit would lead to a reduction in immigration. Others have said that a reduction in EU immigration following Brexit will allow for a corresponding increase in non-EU immigration. These positions are apparently contradictory.

136.Other things being equal, the changes to in-work and child benefits that the Government has negotiated will at best lead to a modest reduction in inward migration from the EU and fall in welfare spending. These changes would also be more consistent with the principle that one should not be able to draw down from the benefit system before one has contributed to it. Other things are not, however, equal. The introduction of the national living wage may significantly offset any effect from these measures by increasing the UK’s attractiveness to migrants. It is inconsistent to claim that migrants are attracted by higher wages when paid by the state in the form of tax credits, but not when paid by employers in the form of the national living wage.

137.So far, free movement has been a non-negotiable part of the single market and EU membership. Just as Boris Johnson and others are almost certainly mistaken to think that the UK could retain unfettered access to EU goods and services markets while ending free movement after leaving the EU, so the Prime Minister was almost certainly mistaken–as is indicated by the contents of the new settlement–to have concluded at the outset of the negotiations that he could succeed in substantially restricting free movement while remaining in the EU. The present situation, in which non-EU migration is increasingly having restrictions placed upon it–in pursuit of an arbitrary target that it is not within the Government’s control to meet–is economically distortive, and is likely to carry a cost, although over the past decade non EU migration has shown no clear declining trend

And on future of EU relations in event of Brexit

Chapter 5 in Full here

138.Any agreement on the UK’s withdrawal from the EU will have to address a large range of issues, including: the UK’s participation in EU-wide programmes; its contributions to the EU budget; the position of British staff working for European institutions; the status and treatment of UK nationals exercising free movement rights in other Member States; and the status and treatment of EU nationals exercising such rights in the UK. The focus of this report is on the economic relationship that the UK might have with the EU after leaving, and in particular the trade arrangements that it might conclude.

139.How far the UK’s economic relationship with the EU would be altered by Brexit would depend on the agreement that was eventually negotiated. In its analysis of the consequences of Brexit, the Centre for European Reform sets out seven alternative relationships, six of which are based on the experiences of other countries, including Turkey, Norway and Switzerland. Campaigners to leave have cited various examples as models that the UK might seek to follow, including Canada, Albania and Switzerland.

140.Such comparisons can be instructive about the sort of post-Brexit arrangements that could be feasible. But they can also be misleading. The UK’s economic relationship with the EU is unlikely to be identical to that of any other country. As a large European country, the UK will seek, and probably be able to obtain, a unique arrangement. However, the terms of that arrangement would be constrained and conditioned by two forces: the views of other EU Member States and UK domestic opinion.

141.The views and interests of other EU Member States. A comprehensive economic and trade agreement with the EU would require the unanimous consent of all Member States’ governments and some Member States’ national parliaments. As Sir Jon Cunliffe put it, “there will be 27 Member States that will not necessarily all share the same view about what the European Union wants from the UK”. Recent events in the EU have shown that the interests of Member States are often not aligned with each other or with those of the UK. The disunity of the Eurozone and the challenges it has faced in making the changes necessary to put the single currency on a sustainable footing, are testament to this.

142.Domestic public opinion. A vote to leave the EU would be an expression of public dissatisfaction with the UK’s existing relationship, and it is likely that any new relationship would need to be different from the status quo. In opinion polls, the public has cited migration as something over which the Government should have greater control, as a major factor in determining their vote, and as something they would expect to fall following a vote to leave. The strength of feeling in this area indicates that there would be a political imperative to reach an agreement that gave the UK the ability to impose controls on migration from the rest of the EU. As Boris Johnson put it, “free movement would be wrong for us”. There may be other areas, such as social and employment regulation and EU budget contributions, where there could be pressure to achieve fundamental change, and repatriate powers currently exercised by the EU. At a minimum, the UK would exclude itself from the automatic jurisdiction of the ECJ.

143.These two forces would likely interact in a way that narrowed the range of possible economic arrangements eventually reached with the EU; for instance, the UK may find it difficult to satisfy public demands for restrictions on free movement, while securing unanimous agreement among EU Member States for unfettered access to the single market. As a Member State, the UK is bound by a set of rights and obligations, upheld and enforced respectively by the ECJ. It is unlikely that the UK could retain exactly the same rights, while significantly curtailing its obligations. Dr Niblett, said:

The British, in my opinion, will not have an easy time of saying, “Now we are out, we want to keep all the good stuff and we do not want the stuff that our citizens do not particularly like. We want to have access to the markets; we want to have all of the stuff that was the single market, but we do not want the people.” The deal for the EU is all four. [goods, services, capital and people]

Interviewed on BBC television on 6 March 2016, Wolfgang Schauble, Germany’s Finance Minister said:

If the decision is taken to leave, the UK will no longer be in the single market unless you find a new treaty, a new contract where you can be a member of the single market without actually being a member of the EU, and you will still have to accept the free movement of people as well, that goes with it, and you have to pay contributions as well. So it doesn’t really make sense.

Angela Merkel has spoken in similar terms:

It [ … ] goes without saying that there are things that are non-negotiable. That there are achievements of European integration that cannot be haggled over, for example the principle of free movement and the principle of non-discrimination.

144.Jean-Claude Juncker has said that “freedom of movement since the Fifties is the basic principle of the European way of co-operating. These rules will not be changed.” He has also said that “deserters won’t be welcomed with open arms.” The European Union General Affairs Council has concluded that “free movement of persons is a fundamental pillar of EU policy and that the internal market and its four freedoms are indivisible”. The European Commission states that “the cornerstones of the single market are the free movement of people, goods, services and capital”.

145.Campaigners to leave the EU have presented different visions of the sort of trade arrangements that the UK would have with the rest of the EU. The Vote Leave website states that “there is a European free trade zone from Iceland to the Russian border and we will be part of it”. In evidence to the Committee, Dominic Cummings made clear that this trade zone covered “free trade in goods”, and argued that being part of a single market in services was “deeply destructive” for the UK. However, tariffs are levied by the EU on certain goods and in certain countries within the “European free trade zone.” The Leave.EU website states that:

Given that the EU sells far more to us than we do to them, the remaining EU member states will seek a trade agreement with the UK that seeks to maintain the same level of free exchange of goods, services and capital as is the case today.

146.In the weeks leading up to the publication of this Report, spokespeople representing Vote Leave have converged on a view that the UK should have “access to” the single market, but not be “part of it”. Michael Gove said in an interview on 8 May that “we should be outside the single market. We should have access to the single market, but we should not be governed by the rules that the European Court of Justice imposes on us, which cost business and restrict freedom”. Boris Johnson said in a speech the following day that “what we want is for Britain to be like many other countries in having free-trade access to the territory covered by the Single Market–but not to be subject to the vast, growing and politically-driven empire of EU law”.

147.After Brexit, the UK’s future relationship with the EU would be unlikely to mimic that of any other country; in this narrow sense, there would indeed be, as Boris Johnson put it, “a British deal”. However, any comprehensive arrangement providing access to EU goods and services markets would require the unanimous consent of the 27 remaining EU Member States.

148.If it is not to call into question the whole purpose of the referendum, a post-Brexit agreement would have to achieve substantive change to the UK’s relationship with the EU. In achieving that change, there would be a trade-off between the extent to which the UK is able to obtain access to EU markets, and the extent to which it regained control over areas where the EU currently has competence. In particular, acquiring greater control over migration policy might well come at the cost of some curtailment of access to other parts of the single market, and hence a reduction in EU trade. In deciding on what sort of relationship to seek, the Government would have to weigh the benefits of additional control against the costs of reduced market access. To sell into the Single Market, its relevant regulatory standards must be met.

149.Achieving the unanimous consent of EU Member States to a comprehensive trade deal would be a significant challenge. Counting in the UK’s favour is the fact that, on leaving, it would become the EU’s largest single trading partner for goods, just ahead of the United States. Moreover, it would be starting from a position of close integration, with the intention of loosening it in certain areas; this is markedly different from conventional trade negotiations, which start from a position of loose integration with the intention of tightening it. Set against this is the fact that Brexit could represent a crisis for the EU. The goodwill of other EU members could not necessarily be relied upon.

150.The sort of deal the UK would reach with the EU, and the access it would have to its markets in the long term, is highly uncertain. It is disingenuous to claim with any confidence, as some representatives from the leave campaign groups have done, that the UK would be able to leave the EU, drop free movement and continue to have the same rights to trade with EU Member States as it does now. The UK would certainly have access, at some level, to the single market on leaving. The question is not whether the UK would have access to the single market, but how far that access would differ from what it enjoys at present. This is a difficult question; nonetheless, the leave campaigns’ leading spokespeople have not answered it.

So you say we will get a deal from Europe that doesn't include freedom of movement?

One thing is for sure, staying will certainly involve freedom of movement. Even if leaving involves keeping it too, for the time being, we haven't lost anything in that respect and will gain in many ways.

Woodhill the Romanian family has priority to housing because they have children who are seen as vulnerable by the authorities and they have a duty to house them. Whilst I don't blame migrants at all for coming to a wealthier country and giving their families a better life I do blame David Cameron and his Remain supporters for ignoring the need for housing of the indigenous population.

How many more Romanian and eventually Turkish, Serbian, Albanian families like those on the council house programme can we let in before we are all reduced to living in third world conditions.

Would you like to add a little more offence or scaremongering to your post Turbinaria.

Not sure you've got UTTER BOLLOCKS covered in its entirety there.

Not really understanding how the Romanian man is entitled to housing and benefits.

It's a mystery, Woodhill. But the prog is there on replay for all to check. The housing officers were aghast at what he'd done. When it seemed it was going to be a No, he and wife did say to each other if they should just go back? That was not interpreted to the housing officer.

I live near and work in a town with the largest Eastern European migrant population and the largest projected increase. The majority of the Polish/Lithuanian/Latvians who have been here years are up in arms about how much more intense the number of migrants have got! Seriously.

It's quite funny really. They complain about it putting pressure on schools, the hospital, jobs. They think we should leave the EU. They especially slag off the Romanians and Bulgarians.

Town is now murder capital of the UK because they keep killing each other!

Remainiacs. Do you all agree that the ultimate aim of the EU is to expand, and later to be part of a One World Government?

It is afterall far more than a simple trading bloc. Some journalists have written along these lines.

The EU is all for expansionism because the world is dividing into blocs. Once you know this it begins to make sense as to why EU wants ailing countries under its belt such as Turkey, Albania, Armenia etc, which is simply for the territory. It is rumoured that the world may look like a series of blocs such as this.

    - Canada, North America, Mexico and South America
    - Europa
    - China-HK-Taiwan 
    - Putin wants to re-establish USSR
    - Korea, Aus and NZ get taken over by China

They will pick off all surrounding countries. Not clear how S.E. Asia, N. Korea or Japan would split.

There will be big fight over Africa as China will want it. China is currently investing heavily in Africa.

More needs to be done to help unemployed back to work, big companies like immigration because they can get very cheap labour, I work in construction and have seen immigrants being taken advantage of

"freedom of movement from what I see is non negotiable"

That's what we are being told because Norway & Switzerland did not fight for it. They vastly underestimated the amount of human traffic that would come to their doors.

Switz has had a referendum calling on govt to renegotiate free movement. That country is probably the most democratic in the West and referenda can be called on just 50,000 signatures from the public. Govt has to return to the table on this issue, but they are waiting to see how our referendum goes first.

Everything is negotiable in business. Are you and others saying that this is it, no member country can ever leave?

turbin's post was spot on actually.

If you lived in these countries and had the chance to come to a country with free education and healthcare to a high standard - well of course you would do it.

Families with children are (rightly) prioritised but this is why have the utterly nonsensical situation whereby families make them selves intentionally homeless and arrive for their house and benefits.

You might not like that but it is happening!

No wonder the poor in this country are so fed up with the effing EU

no member country can ever leave

With the scaremongering and threats it would seem that's the idea. We should leave now while we can.

People in every country in the world LIKE THEIR OWN COUNTRY. Love their own people & culture.
Why is that so hard to understand?
Very few people ever leave country of birth unless they are tortured or the economic situation is dire.

lljjkk good lord, do you really believe that?

These poor buggers crossing in boats from Africa are just having a laugh then?

The half a million Polish folk just here for a long holiday?

People have always moved and always will and why not? Unless the same countries are chosen and implode....