Net Immigration Falls 10 Percent From Record High

Border Force check the passports of passengers arriving at Gatwick Airport near London on May 28, 2014. Oli Scarff/Getty Images

Last year, net immigration decreased by 10 percent to 685,000 after having hit a record high of 764,000 in 2022, according to newly-released figures.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said on Thursday that while it is too early to say if this fall is the start of a new downward trend, emigration had increased last year, “particularly among non-EU nationals who initially arrived in the UK on study-related visas.”

In relation to total long-term immigration, 1,218,000 people arrived in the year to 2023, which the ONS said was “broadly similar” to the end of December 2022 when 1,257,000 people arrived from abroad to live in the UK.

Home Secretary James Cleverly said the latest figures show that the Conservative Party’s immigration plan is “working.”

The Home Office also said this week that visa applications in key routes have fallen by one-quarter in the first four months of 2024, which Mr. Cleverly said was evidence that measures were having a “major impact” on immigration numbers.

Net Immigration ‘Unusually High’

The Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford commented on the data release, observing that net immigration “remained at unusually high levels” and that the 2023 data set marks the third year running that overall net immigration “has exceeded the pre-Brexit, pre-Covid levels of roughly 200,000 to 300,000.”

However, the independent data analysis body noted that the “sharp drop” in visa grants this year and the increase in students leaving “hint at the start of a long-expected fall in net migration.”

Further, the ONS said these figures cover a period before the implementation of government rules which tighten up immigration routes for work-, study-, and family-related visas which came into effect at the beginning of this year.

India and Nigeria Top Immigration List

The ONS data showed that the top four non-EU nationalities for long-term immigration flows—where people move to the UK for a period of more than one year—were Indian (250,000), Nigerian (141,000), Chinese (90,000), and Pakistani (83,000).

The statistics agency noted that since 2019, the number of Indians, Nigerians, and Pakistanis coming to the UK “has seen the largest increase,” with approximately 178,000 more Indians, 127,000 more Nigerians, and 62,000 more Pakistanis immigrating last year compared with five years ago.

The ONS referenced Home Office data which found that Nigerians, Pakistanis, and Indians “made up the majority of those granted visas to work in the UK.” Nationals from China, India, Nigeria, and Pakistan were also identified as the “largest contributors” to non-EU immigration on study-related visas in the year ending December 2022.

For the first time since 2019, people from outside the EU arriving on long-term work-related visas overtook study as the primary reason for immigration. The ONS said that those who had arrived in the UK to work (main applicants and their dependents) made up 41 percent of long-term immigration among non-EU nationals.

The ONS referenced Home Office statistics from February, saying this growth comes from an increase in visas granted under the “Skilled Worker – Health and Care” category, where the number of main applicants had almost doubled (91 percent).

Illegal Immigration Drops 28 Percent

Separate Home Office statistics published on Thursday on illegal immigration showed that there were 38,546 illegal arrivals in the year ending to March 2024, a fall of 28 percent on the year before.

Arrival by small boat across the English Channel has been the predominant recorded method of illegal entry since 2020, with more than four in five (81 percent) arriving by this means last year. Since 2018—when the illegal Channel crossings phenomenon began—there have been 117,697 small boat arrivals.

The top five nationalities for arriving illegally by boat were Afghans (19 percent), Iranians (12 percent), Turkish nationals (11 percent), Eritreans (10 percent), and Iraqis (9 percent).

Estimated long-term net migration to the UK. PA

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak made stopping the boats one of his five priorities last year, with his Rwanda scheme at the heart of his plans.

Immigration—both legal and illegal—is expected to be a key election battleground topic in the weeks ahead of the July 4 election, which Mr. Sunak announced on Wednesday.

Mr. Cleverly urged Britons to vote for the Conservatives in the election, saying that while net immigration is down, more needs to be done.

“The choice is clear in this election—sticking with our bold, clear plan to control immigration with Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives or going back to square one with Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour Party, who don’t believe in immigration controls, want an illegal immigration amnesty, and have no plan to stop the boats,” the home secretary said.

Undated file photo showing a group of people thought to be illegal immigrants brought in to Dungeness, Kent, by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. Gareth Fuller/PA

In light of the figures, Labour accused the Conservatives of total “chaos and failure.”

Yvette Cooper MP, who as shadow home secretary could be in charge of immigration in the event of a Labour victory, said on Thursday, “These figures show the total Tory chaos and failure on immigration as net migration has more than trebled since Rishi Sunak and his party promised to get it down at the last election.”

“14 years of Conservative failure on both the economy and immigration has led to around a 50 percent increase in work migration in the last year alone because they have disastrously failed to tackle skills shortages. The Tories can’t even manage to clean up their own chaos,” Ms. Cooper said.

PA Media contributed to this report.