‘Latest net migration figures are too high’, says former head of UK border control

Matt Frei: So when Keir Starmer said that the Tories’ policy on migration was an experiment in open borders by design, do you think he was right?
Tony Smith: I think there’s a bit of political rhetoric creeping into some of these discussions, but I think it is fair to say that the last government did preside over record numbers of immigration, much of which was within their control. Small boat irregular arrivals only account for about 10% of this number. A lot of the intake over the last couple of years have been visas issued to workers, workers dependents, students, student dependents. I think the Conservatives realised this was creeping up too high towards the end of their tenure. They did make some changes, which is why we’ve seen a small drop in the numbers this year over last year. But it’s going to take some time, I think, for those changes to take real effect.
Matt Frei: Now, the Prime Minister talked quite tough, didn’t he, today? I mean, the language at times sounded almost like Nigel Farage. But does he have a plan to match the tough rhetoric?
Tony Smith: Well, if he has, I haven’t seen it yet. Not on legal migration. We’ve heard a lot from the government about what they’re going to do about illegal migration and smashing the gangs. But we haven’t had any clear policy statements about what they’re going to do about visas. I think some of the measures that were introduced by the Conservative government have been placed on pause while they have a look at this. I think they’re fortunate. They will see a gradual reduction anyway as a result of the changes, provided they don’t overturn them, that’s the changes that were made under the last administration, but this is still very, very high numbers.
And I think most people, whether they’re on the right or the left, would agree that these figures, these latest net migration figures are too high. And also, you know, we’re not very good at counting, are we, because we’ve just revised the 23 and the 22 figures upwards. And it’s very possible that the figures that have been announced today will also be revised upwards when we get to this time next year.
Matt Frei: And upwards by a considerable margin. So pretty lousy at counting. I just wondered, I know you don’t like to talk politics, but is there a political risk for Sir Keir Starmer to use the tough language of the right on migration but not actually able to do anything about it?
Tony Smith: Well, I think the proof of the pudding is in the eating. I spent 40 years working in the Home Office, working for lots of different governments who made lots of different promises. But ultimately the electorate will tell you if you’ve delivered on your promises or if you haven’t. I can remember the Blair government saying they made mistakes actually when they were in office, on this. We’ve just had an acknowledgement from the Conservatives yesterday that they also made mistakes.
But this is within government control. They can control how many visas get issued. They simply need to make that clear to Whitehall departments about what their policy is. Some will argue that we need more migrants for economic reasons. Others will say that we’ve got far too many because we can’t afford the service provision. That’s what the arguments are all about.
Matt Frei: But isn’t that also the problem? We saw that in Paul’s piece about the care sector. The care sector needs people yesterday. It is an awful lot of people all the time. And they simply can’t wait for the right numbers of people in this country who are already here, to get trained up for those jobs. How do you persuade them not to bring in people from outside?
Tony Smith: Well, I think you have to make employment such as those more attractive, don’t you? I think that is really the crux of this, is that employers are turning to overseas migrants because they know overseas migrants, some of them, will work for considerably less money than the indigenous population. So we need to look at those industries and make them more attractive for people so that they are prepared to work in those industries. And I think, you know, we’ve seen recent reports about the number of people already in this country who are economically inactive for one reason or another. And I think that’s where the focus needs to go. I’ve heard slogans before from politicians about British jobs for British people and all that. But I do think it’s more fundamental than that. We’ve got a very significant population increase now as a result of immigration. We need to make sure that as much of that population as possible is economically active and providing for GDP per capita, not just GDP, but GDP per capita. So they are net actually contributors to society. That’s what we really need.