UK immigration figures breakdown: Where migrants are from and why they’re arriving | EUROtoday

Sir Keir Starmer has accused the previous Tory authorities of working a “one-nation experiment in open borders”, whereas Kemi Badenoch admitted her social gathering “did not deliver” on immigration.

A complete of 1.2 million folks arrived within the UK within the 12 months as much as June 2024, in response to the most recent ONS figures launched in the present day.

Net migration – the above determine, minus those that left the UK – stands at 728,000 for the 12 months as much as June 2024.

This would have been consistent with current estimates of the earlier 12 months, ending June 2023, however the ONS issued a revision, considerably rising final 12 months’s figures from 740,000 to 906,000.

The revised figures, which mark a brand new record-high in internet migration, have been partially attributed to lacking numbers of Ukraine visas, and changes to predicting long-term migrants.

In gentle of those modifications, internet migration within the 12 months to June 2024 is down 20 per cent from the earlier 12 months.

An more and more excessive proportion of these arriving are non-EU nationals, who outnumber EU immigrants round seven occasions over.

What the numbers say on migration

It is obvious that internet migration continues to be hovering.

Reform UK chief Nigel Farage has taken a swipe on the earlier authorities, saying he has “had enough of the lies, of the deceptions, we’ve had years and years of it”.

Since Britain left the EU, immigration to the UK has gone up, and has not come near pre-Brexit ranges.

Free motion resulted in January 2021 and Brexit immigration guidelines got here into power. Since June 2021, at the least 3.6 million immigrants have entered the UK.

Net migration is at 2.3 million over that interval.

Latest information up within the 12 months as much as June 2024 reveals that non-EU nationals make up 86 % of whole immigration into the UK.

The nation with the very best variety of folks coming into the UK is India, adopted by Nigeria.

The Independent’s social affairs correspondent Holly Bancroft reported that the variety of Vietnamese nationals coming into the UK by small boat has risen by 177 %.

This is linked to a brand new settlement between Vietnam and Hungary, which is enabling simpler entry to different European nations.

Most immigration is for work or examine

In a time when the NHS and social care sectors are dealing with main staffing shortages, visas for well being and care employees from overseas have dropped by 62 per cent.

The NHS has greater than 31,000 reported vacancies, whereas 131,000 posts are vacant in social care, with a complete scarcity of 162,000 throughout the 2 fields.

Just 50,591 well being and care employee visas have been granted as much as June 2024, which the federal government attributed to a drop in candidates.

New tighter regulation launched in December 2023 stopped permitting abroad care employees to convey their dependants, which is a possible issue.

However, work and examine each stay the very best causes for immigration within the UK, with asylum and humanitarian causes making up round 15 per cent of immigration in whole.

Up to June this 12 months, there was a fall within the variety of examine dependants coming into the UK. The identical rule modifications above imply that almost all worldwide college students can not convey relations with them.

Sanctuary drops for Ukraine and Hong Kong

Since 2021 and 2022 respectively, the UK has been granting sanctuary to residents of Hong Kong and Ukraine.

Yet numbers of sanctuary granted for each teams have dropped considerably within the 12 months as much as June 2024.

Just half the variety of sanctuary visas have been granted to Ukranians in comparison with final 12 months, dropping by 53 per cent to 29,506 grants.

Meanwhile, sanctuary grants to these from Hong Kong has dropped by almost 1 / 4 (to 30,000).

The Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme (ACRS), which was opened in 2022, has seen a pointy uptick this 12 months however continues to be under 10,000 grants yearly.