21st Century Challenges

A Polish expert on migration says claims that half of all Polish immigrants to Britain have returned home are not true.

David Cameron called yesterday for the population of Britain to be kept below 70 million. The Conservative Party leader said that it was not unrealistic to reduce net immigration to levels recorded in the 1990s and that the current trends were “too much”.

Gordon Brown has promised to "tighten" the UK's immigration rules by reducing the number of professions which can recruit from outside Europe.

The population of the UK will rise from 61m to 71.6m by 2033 if current trends in growth continue, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has said.

Just over two-thirds of the increase is likely to be related directly or indirectly to migration to the UK.

A drop in the number of migrant workers in Britain is threatening to create skill shortages and delay the country's recovery from recession, the Ernst & Young Item Club economic forecasters have warned.

Foreign-born workers are proving more successful at holding on to their jobs in the recession than their British-born counterparts, according to Financial Times research.

Instead of sending out mixed messages, the government needs to take the courage to say that migrants have helped us

Thousands of highly skilled migrants may receive compensation after the High Court ruled that changes to the rules under which they originally entered Britain were unfair

More than three-quarters – 78 per cent – of British adults believe immigrants should be asked to leave the country if they do not have a job, according to an FT/Harris survey published

Britain is set to become the biggest country in the European Union by 2050, fuelled by nearly 200,000 new migrants every year, according to estimates from the United Nations

Migration restrictions are a bad way to fight unemployment in times of crisis. There is no evidence less immigration means less unemployment in the UK or anywhere else

42 per cent of Labour voters and 62 per cent of Conservative backers agree that immigration should be reduced

The Annual Population Study, Office for National Statistics (ONS), shows the number of short-term migrants entering England and Wales for employment or study purposes for stays of between one and 12 months fell to 374,000 in the year to mid-2007, a 13% decrease from the mid-2006 estimate.

Non-UK born workers now account for one in seven jobs after more than 1.8 million foreigners were added to the UK labour force over the last decade.

The use of migrant labour in Britain will decline abruptly as companies face a sharp fall in demand for their goods and services, the Confederation of British Industry told MPs yesterday.

Under the new system, ministers say migrants - excluding those from the European Economic Area - will pass through three clear stages. In future, they will need to spend the next six to eight years proving their worth to the UK as part of a personal journey and contract with British society.

For the first time in more than three decades,  record numbers of Australians are leaving Britain and its economic gloom for better job opportunities

Net immigration to the UK increased to 237,000 in 2007, according to the Office for National Statistics.

Almost 80,000 asylum-seekers from countries described by theForeign Office as dangerous and unstable have been refused refuge in Britain in the past five years.

Immigration is the issue most Londoners are worried about for the next five years, a survey has shown.

The new immigration minister has suggested that the Government may introduce a cap on the number of migrants coming to Britain.

The Home Office's Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) yesterday published its first list of the kinds of job that it believes can be filled by migrant workers of any nationality.

Immigrant workers fill skill gaps and do jobs British workers do not want, says a report by the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR)

The UK could be home to almost three-quarters of a million illegal immigrants, a study for London Mayor Boris Johnson suggests.