4m migrants work in the UK
BRITISH workers are losing out in the battle for scarce jobs because of soaring numbers of migrants from within the EU.
Nearly four million people working in the UK between July and September this year were born abroad, the Office for National Statistics revealed yesterday.
The figure is 204,000 up on 2009, a rise of 5.5 per cent and nearly half of the influx are economic immigrants from the new EU member states in eastern Europe.
The number of British-born workers in employment grew by just 0.4 per cent.
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The figures came a day before the Migration Advisory Committee was due to publish its recommendations for an annual migration cap today.
Ministers have pledged to cut annual migration to the UK from 176,000 to “tens of thousands”.
But freedom of movement laws drawn up by Brussels mean any cap is powerless to halt the flow of eastern Europeans.
And last week it emerged that Britain could be forced to accept a fresh wave of foreign workers under secret plans by the European Commission. Officials want the UK to take 40 per cent of up to 50,000 Indian skilled migrants expected to come to Europe every year under a free trade deal. The quota is almost seven times that proposed for France.
Last night, critics lined up to attack Britain’s lax immigration policy and called for tougher laws to stem the tide of cheap migrant labour at a time when the UK jobs market is under pressure.
Alp Mehmet, of campaign group MigrationWatch, said: “This just proves what we have been saying all along. The majority of jobs created in this country are going to overseas workers. It is right that the Government should be cutting back on economic migrants and creating incentives for our own people to go into employment.
“At a time when 16 per cent of our IT graduates are unemployed we should not be taking in thousands of IT workers from India.
“We are shooting ourselves in the foot.”
Gerard Batten, immigration spokesman for Ukip, said: “These figures make a mockery of the Conservatives’ plans to cap migrants coming to this country. What they show is that there is a continual conveyor belt of cheap labour being brought to the UK by big business. It drives down wages, boosts the population and drains public services but does not add to the well-being of indigenous workers.”
Philip Davies, Conservative backbench MP said: “We are mad in this country to have people born abroad coming here and doing jobs that people here are capable of doing. It gives the lie to the story that there are no jobs here.
“I am all in favour of migration caps but I would like control of immigration from inside the EU too.
“Just having control of immigration outside of the EU is a bit pointless because we are only as strong as the borders on the EU’s furthest outpost and they are not under our control.”
Figures released by the ONS showed that while the number of UK-born workers over the age of 16 grew by 100,000 in the last year, there was more than double that from overseas with 204,000.
The home-grown total rose from 25.3 million to 25.4 million. Their foreign counterparts numbered just more than 3.88 million, up from 3.68m in 2009. Around 90,000 – a rise of 18 per cent – of the extra overseas contingent come from the eight new EU members including Poland, Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
India and all the African countries apart from South Africa contributed 50,000 each. India’s proportion rose by more than 14 per cent and Africa’s by 9.1 per cent.
There are 12,000 South Africans working in this country, up 8.4 per cent.
The number of workers born in the 14 other EU countries actually fell by 14,000 as they scrambled to get away from the hard hit British economy.
Employment rates among British-born 16 to 64-year-olds were standing at 71.3 per cent – lower than eastern Europeans, Indians, South Africans, Australians and New Zealanders.
Ever since announcing plans for a cap David Cameron has been under pressure from business leaders claiming the visa limit would damage recruitment.
Suggestions the Prime Minister had been influenced by their concerns triggered fears among Tory backbenchers that the Government will do a U-turn on its pledge to slash immigration and damage its standing with voters and the party faithful.
