Blogs

There are reports in today’s newspapers of fraud on an industrial scale by which applicants for student visas are enabled to arrange for fluent English speakers to present them for the purpose of being tested on their proficiency in English.  It will be the subject of a Panorama programme on

1. The Office of National Statistics (ONS) revises its population projections for the UK every two years.  The 2012 based projections have recently been published. [1] 2. The population is currently around 64 million. By the end of the next Parliament it is projected to have grown by 3 million people –

Last night on the BBC2 programme “The truth about immigration”, Vince Cable was dismissive of the government’s immigration objective and suggested that it was time to be “practical”. As it happens, the Lib Dem think tank Centre Forum has just published a paper, sprinkled with quotations from Vince Cable, entitled

UK Wages and Benefits a Magnet to Two Million Romanians and Bulgarians in Spain and Italy Some of the two million Romanian and Bulgarian migrants in Spain and Italy may find the lure of Britain difficult to resist. This is the conclusion of a new report from the think tank Migration

Summary 1. Large scale immigration by low paid workers from the EU reduces the wages of low skilled British workers, adds nothing to GDP per head but adds considerably to pressure on public services. In-work benefits are a huge incentive and must be reformed. Recommendations are at paragraph 14. Introduction

Comment on Scottish White Paper The proposals in the Scottish White Paper issued on 26 November are unsound for Scotland and unacceptable to the rest of the UK.  They would provide a barn door to England. That is the conclusion of a study released today by Migration Watch UK. The White