This article originally appeared in our Elevenses newsletter.
Migration figures published by the Office for National Statistics last week make for sobering reading for a government elected primarily on its ability to whip up nationalist fervour. Put simply, this country has never seen numbers like it, with population-adjusted data tracking back to 1850 underscoring a “totally unprecedented” rise, Ed Conway said, one that can be pinpointed to new rules brought about as part of Boris Johnson’s Brexit Agreement.
Political commentators have been quick to suggest small boat crossings and the upheaval in Ukraine and Hong Kong are behind the rise, but in both cases, events that have dominated headlines and government rhetoric appear to have had a marginal impact on the overall situation, with the number of people arriving by humanitarian routes actually falling from 19 per cent to nine per cent in the period in question. Study remained the biggest contributor to non-EU immigration, while people coming to the country on health and care visas were the next biggest contributor. Most people arriving in the UK in the year ending June 2023 were non-EU nationals (968,000), followed by EU (129,000) and British (84,000), the ONS said.
The year ending June 2023 is also notable for being a period in which Suella Braverman, known for her “poisonous” rhetoric towards migrants (cite Lord Dubs), was the person responsible for immigration control, a small detail that she seemed to have overlooked when she blasted the government for their inability to control our borders. Ex-prime ministers, cabinet members and prominent Brexiteers who had campaigned with similar pledges tattooed across their foreheads were also among those calling for the government to take action as though the last 13 years hadn’t happened. Johnson, among them, obviously, even suggested the “anti-Brexit brigade” will have “succumbed to a collective orgasm of excitement” over the migrant figures, even though, as evidenced above, he is the one responsible for catapulting them to where they are now.
This puts two lies at the heart of the Brexit campaign of which both, I would attest, are equally egregious. On the one hand, there is the lie that leaving the EU will bring migration down, which it has failed to do quite spectacularly. As Gavin Esler puts it, “any politician who campaigned for Brexit cannot now legitimately complain about the increase in migration. They are directly responsible for it”. And on the other, it has once again exposed the government’s inability to be honest about the country’s need for immigrants, which as Conway has previously argued, most probably offers our best chance of returning back to economic growth and prosperity.
In a campaign that was characterised by lies and liars, that surely has to be at the top of the pile.
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