Each illegal immigrant to cost us £1million

AN AMNESTY allowing illegal immigrants to stay in the UK would cost a staggering £1million for each newcomer.

COST Immigrants waiting to enter the UK queue up to be fed by charities in Calais COST: Immigrants waiting to enter the UK queue up to be fed by charities in Calais

For the first time, the “huge, unnecessary burden” of letting up to 950,000 foreign nationals remain is revealed today by campaign group Migrationwatch.

They say the move would be a “shocking waste of public money” when the nation is in the depths of recession.

The pressure group also say a similar cost, based on people having children and earning low wages, could apply to many people who have already been granted asylum.

And they warn that such an amnesty would only tempt more illegal immigrants into Britain – as has happened in Italy and Spain where migrants have been allowed to stay.

A coalition of churches, unions and others are holding church services and a mass rally today in support of an “earned amnesty” for an estimated 450,000 long-term illegal immigrants if they meet certain conditions.

The Institute for Public Policy Research, Labour’s favourite think-tank, claimed the move could bring in more than £1billion of tax a year.

And Conservative London Mayor Boris Johnson has argued for an amnesty for long-term illegal immigrants of good character who can support themselves so that they contribute to tax revenues. A study for Mr Johnson by the London School of

Economics has estimated that there were between 524,000 and 947,000 “irregular residents” and their children in Britain at the end of 2007, with a “central estimate” of 725,000.

But Migrationwatch today publishes what it says is the first estimate of the “lifetime cost” to taxpayers of letting people stay in the UK.

It is based on a 25-year-old, married with two children, who earned the minimum wage and lived in private rented housing, retired at 65 and lived until 80.

Setting the tax and National Insurance paid against their demands on the public purse, including housing and council tax benefit and pension credit, brings their lifetime cost to taxpayers to some £900,000, with a bill of £1.1 million in London.

Migrationwatch chairman Sir Andrew Green said last night: “The numbers are truly enormous, adding an unacceptable, and entirely unnecessary, burden to the nation’s balance sheet at a time when Boris Johnson himself is writing about ‘the horrific state of the nation’s finances’.”

Sir Andrew acknowledged that some immigrants would earn over the minimum wage and thus take lower welfare payments, but some may have more than two children and so get higher benefit.

“Or they may be unemployed. Immigrants are, on average, more likely to be economically inactive than the UK as a whole,” he added.

The report says the cost of granting settlement to an asylum seeker who did not achieve higher earnings, although many would do so, would be similar.

The campaign group says this makes Home Office failure to appear at up to a third of asylum appeals “reprehensible”. Sir Andrew added: “It is also a shocking waste of public money at a time when we can least afford it.”

In Italy an amnesty in 1988 let 119,000 foreigners settle, but when the exercise was repeated in 2002 the figure soared to 700,000. In Spain the figure rose from 44,000 in 1985 to 700,000 in 2005.

Observers noted that the costs calculated by Migrationwatch could also apply to people born in the UK who made the same demands on the state.

Campaigners for an amnesty were boosted yesterday by the policy research think-tank, which said tighter controls and action to reduce the number of immigrants could enable the Government to consider giving illegal entrants a chance to earn the right to stay.

Today, thousands of people are expected join services at churches and a rally in Trafalgar Square as part of a Strangers into Citizens “day of action”.

But a UK Border Agency spokesman said the Government firmly opposed amnesties, adding: “Those here illegally should go home, not go to the front of the queue for jobs and benefits. To grant an amnesty would be likely to create a significant pull factor to the UK and would undermine the asylum system as a whole.”

Shadow Immigration Minister Damian Green said experience showed amnesties encouraged illegal immigration. He added: “The long-term solution is to have an efficient asylum system which allows people to have their cases heard quickly, so we do not develop the huge backlog from which this Government now suffers.”

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