A selection of recent media reports
Bride given dress in St Leonards 'marriage scam'
A woman was paid £2,000 and given a wedding dress for her wedding to an African man as part of an immigration scam run by a vicar, a jury has...
UK Wired News (16-Jun-2010)
Lithuanian woman 'given £2,000 moments before sham marriage'
A Lithuanian woman had her wedding dress bought for her the day before she married an African man she barely knew as part of an alleged sham marriage racket, a court heard...
The Independent (16-Jun-2010)
Twelve 'illegal immigrants' arrested
Twelve people have been arrested following a swoop on a scrap metal yard in Kent, police have said. Officers from Kent Police working with the UK Border Agency (UKBA) executed a warrant at A2 Car Breakers in Watling Street in Dartford at 11am on...
Rye & Battle Observer (16-Jun-2010)
2014 Games may lure trafficked prostitutes, MSPs are warned
THE Commonwealth Games could prove a magnet for human traffickers smuggling women into Scotland to work as prostitutes, MSPs have been...
The Scotsman (16-Jun-2010)
MUSLIM EXTREMISTS PROTEST AT SOLDIERS' HOMECOMING PARADE
MUSLIM extremists provoked outrage yesterday when they branded British troops murderers at a homecoming parade attended by relatives of soldiers killed in...
Daily Express (16-Jun-2010)
Lack of trafficking cases slammed
Not a single prosecution has been brought against human traffickers in Scotland, it is claimed. A Holyrood committee was told that more than 100 prosecutions have taken place in England and Wales but none in...
The Scotsman (15-Jun-2010)
Only half of UK arrivals checked against terrorist list
A GOVERNMENT programme that aims to monitor every person coming in and out of Britain is checking only half of all passengers' movements. Last night, the security minister, Baroness Neville Jones, admitted the e-Borders programme was checking "approximately 50 per cent" of passengers well below the...
The Scotsman (15-Jun-2010)
Afghan children smuggled to Europe
MORE than 5,900 Afghan children were smuggled into Europe last year. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees said children were being pushed by parents to leave with smugglers in order to earn money and send it back...
The Scotsman (15-Jun-2010)
Press Releases
Migrationwatch comment on OBR Report on Immigration
June 15, 2010Some press reports have implied that the Office for Budget Responsibility has come up with a revised estimate of net immigration. It has not. It has chosen to adopt an estimate over the next five years that is close to the low migration scenario of theONS. This produces a conservative estimate of the increase in the labour force.
A reduction in immigration is always associated with a recession but, over the past three recessions it has bounced back in the medium term to its trend growth. In any case, it is not total GDP that matters but GDP per head, as the House of Lords Economic Committee pointed out in their ground breaking report of April 2008. As they put it, 'Overall GDP, which the government has persistently emphasised, is an irrelevant and misleading criterion for assessing the economic impacts of immigration on the UK'.
Nor should it be assumed that all immigrants add to the labour force. Most immigrants do not enter as labour migrants; a significant proportion will be dependants and others who are economically inactive.
Commenting, Sir Andrew Green, Chairman of Migrationwatch, said ‘If only life were so simple. In fact, the immigration lobby has been a little too quick to jump on this aspect of the report which is no more than a short term and conservative assumption that the OBR have chosen to make.’
Labour's "Tough" Points Based System Actually Increased Immigration
June 3, 2010Analysis of the latest immigration statistics by think-tank Migrationwatch (See Annex A in the full press release) has revealed what Labour were anxious to conceal during the election campaign, namely that their so called "tough" Points Based System (PBS) has actually led to an increase in immigration.
For several months, the previous government declined to answer Parliamentary questions on the subject. They claimed that the PBS would admit only those that the British economy needed.
However, analysis now reveals that economic migration in 2009 was up by about 20% compared to 2007, the year before the introduction of the PBS for non-EU workers. This took place despite the deepest recession for a generation having led to unemployment of 2.5 million.
The number of students, also part of the PBS, increased by 30% in 2009 compared to 2008 before the system applied to students.
Commenting, Sir Andrew Green, Chairman of Migrationwatch said: ‘This is Labour's guilty secret. When they talked about immigration at all before and during the election campaign, they claimed that they were getting it under control with their tough new system. The truth was quite different. They have left an immigration system in chaos and the coalition government with a huge mountain to climb in order to fulfil the Prime Minister’s election promise, re-affirmed on 20 May, that net immigration would be brought down from the present level of 160,000 to tens of thousands as in the 1980s and early 1990s.’
Immigration Issue Might Have Swung The Election
June 1, 2010A tougher stance on immigration from the political parties could have changed the result of the General Election, a new opinion poll has revealed.
The poll, by YouGov for think tank Migrationwatch, shows that the Conservatives might have won an outright majority if they had adopted 'a stronger stance on controlling immigration.'
54% who selected Conservatives as their second voting preference listed a stronger stance on immigration as one of up to three policies that the Conservatives would have needed to promise to adopt in order for them to change their vote.
This equates to 5% of all GB adults.
The top three issues selected from the list provided were 'A stronger stance on controlling immigration' (54%), 'Increasing the state pension' (32%) and 'Withdrawal from the European Union' (30%). 13% said nothing would have made them actually switch their vote.
For the Lib Dems the survey showed that 42% of those who selected Lib Dems as their second voting preference listed a stronger stance on controlling immigration as one of up to three policies that the Lib Dems would have needed to promise to introduce in order for them to change their vote.
This equates to 10% of all GB adults.
The top three issues selected from the list provided were 'A stronger stance on controlling immigration' (42%), 'Increasing the state pension' (28%)an d 'Scrapping prescription charges' (18%). 20% said nothing would have made them actually switch their vote.
'It is clear from these figures, as well as the recent comments from the contenders for the Labour leadership, that immigration was, after the economy, the foremost concern for the vast majority of voters and yet none of the parties properly addressed it,' said Sir Andrew Green, Migrationwatch chairman.
'Had the parties listened to the public we might have a very different political landscape. The new government will have the public behind them in taking serious measures to address mass immigration. What is more, they will be held to account if they fail to do so,' he said.
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