UK Immigration figures down

Damian Green, the minister in charge of immigration, has said that new figures released by the Office for National Statistics prove that the government is achieving its aim of reducing the number of people entering the country. However, although net immigration appears to have dropped from 252,000 to 216,000, the ONS said that the margin for error was high enough to make the difference too difficult to discount.

Critics of the government have said that it was pointless for a target of fewer than 100,000 to be aimed at if it could not even guarantee a difference of 36,000.

Oxford University’s Migration Observatory director Martin Ruhs said the margin of error was far too large to make the figures reliable. He added that it made it difficult for the government to know whether it is on track for reducing the number of immigrants to below 100,000 per year.

The ONS said the number of people entering the UK and staying for the long-term had remained at approximately the same level since 2004. The number of people leaving the country appears to have risen. Emigration figures for 2010 indicate that 350,000 people left the country compared to 339,000 the year before.

The latest figures have been released as London Metropolitan University has had its right to issue visas to overseas students revoked.