My Lords, there will be plenty of time later to tackle the many complications in this Bill. For my part, I will make a short speech but I will take a longer and wider view.
It is now about 20 years since I co-founded Migration Watch UK, with the assistance of Professor David Coleman of Oxford University. In that time, the UK’s
population has grown by an astonishing 8 million. That is about eight times the population of Birmingham and close to the population of London. Of this huge number, nearly 7 million has been due to immigration— seven out of eight. That includes the inflow of asylum seekers, which has gone up and down over that period. Nobody likes to say this, but it is surely obvious that, if this inflow is allowed to continue, the whole nature of our society will be changed—not in our time but certainly in our grandchildren’s.
The Government have claimed that their new “Australian- style” immigration system will get the numbers down. Regrettably, that is the exact opposite of the truth. The Government have actively encouraged large-scale economic migration. I briefly mention three measures: they have substantially reduced the educational requirement; they have significantly lowered the salary requirement; and they no longer require jobs first to be advertised on the domestic market. As a result, nearly half of all full-time jobs are now open to immigrant labour—yes, nearly half. It is extraordinary.
The current scale of immigration, of which asylum is only a small part, simply cannot be allowed to continue. The pressure on our schools and public services is heavy and increasing. We already have to build—wait for it—nearly 300 homes every single day just to house immigrant families. Regrettably, that is very seldom mentioned in this House.
That is the wider background to this Bill. Public anger at the chaos in the channel has obliged the Government to focus on that appalling problem but, even at 50,000 a year, as last year, asylum is only a small part of immigration as a whole. When the numbers for calendar year 2022 are published in two weeks’ time, we may well find that net migration is running at 10 times the rate of asylum—that is, about half a million. It could be even higher. If this mass immigration is allowed to continue, it will very rapidly change the way of life that we have developed over centuries. It will also weaken our sense of community as a society. The public sense this, of course, which is why nearly 60% of them want to see immigration reduced.
The Bill may have some impact on one aspect of mass immigration. However, I repeat that asylum, however chaotic, is at present only a small part of a wider issue. A real reduction in net migration, whatever its source, is now essential to preserve the nature of the country that many of us love.
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