Net migration to the UK has fallen by 10 per cent, according to official estimates, as Rishi Sunak was forced to admit no deportation flights to Rwanda would take off pre-election.
After hitting a new record of 764,000 in 2022, revised official estimates now show UK net migration – the difference between those arriving and leaving – fell by 10 per cent last year.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) put net migration to the UK in the year to December 2022 at higher than previously thought by 19,000, up from a previous estimate of 745,000.
However, the figure for the year to December 2023 is estimated to be lower, at 685,000, but the ONS said it is too early to tell if this is the start of a new downward trend.
Some 1.22m people are estimated to have arrived in the UK in 2023, while 532,000 are likely to have left—compared with 1.26m and 493,000, respectively, in 2022.
The data suggested that work was the biggest driver of migration in 2023, overtaking study. There was a substantial rise in people arriving from outside the EU on work-related visas.
It comes just a day after Sunak unexpectedly called a general election for July 4—in six weeks—and hours after he was forced to confirm that his flagship Rwanda policy to crack down on illegal migration is not set to take effect before the ballot.
Sunak told LBC Radio this morning that flights carrying migrants to Rwanda will take off “after the election”, pledging: “If I’m elected, we will get the flights off.”
Pressed further on timing, he said: “No, after the election. The preparation work has already gone on.”
Opponents criticised Sunak for failing to believe in his own policy, with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer telling reporters in Gillingham: “I don’t think he’s ever believed that plan is going to work and so he has called an election early enough to have it not tested before the election.”
While Reform UK leader Richard Tice said the Prime Minister had “bottled it” and decided to “cut and run” by calling a summer election instead of holding on for the autumn.
The net migration figures also sparked a reaction among Tory MPs, with the issue set to be a key campaign battleground for both main parties. This follows days of speculation over Sunak’s plans to scrap the graduate visa, with senior cabinet ministers reporting warnings against it.
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The Home Office stressed the estimates “do not take into account the major package measures announced in December which have already started to have an effect”.
Home Secretary James Cleverly insisted the statistics show “the plan under Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives is working, but there is more to do” and warned against “going back to square one with Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party who don’t believe in immigration controls”.
But former immigration minister Robert Jenrick hit out at the government for reinstating the graduate visa two years ago which was scrapped under the coalition administration.
“It’s not worked as they envisaged,” he said. “And some of the universities that have taken advantage of it are essentially selling immigration rather than education.”
Ryan Shorthouse, founder of BrightBlue, a centre-right think tank, stressed that net migration was falling and predicted it would continue to decline.
“Politicians therefore should not panic and introduce unnecessary measures, such as abolishing the graduate route,” he said.
Labour’s shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper reacted, saying: “14 years of Conservative failure on both the economy and immigration has led to around a 50 per cent increase in work migration in the last year alone because they have disastrously failed to tackle skills shortages.
“Labour will bring in proper plans to link the points-based immigration system with boosting skills here at home.”
And Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesperson Alistair Carmichael said: “No matter how the Conservatives try to twist the truth, the asylum backlog remains sky-high.
“The British people deserve a Government that can finally implement a compassionate, effective asylum system after years of Conservative mismanagement.”