Key Facts 12.1

A dozen key facts on immigration

Migrants are arriving at the rate of 500,000 a year - or nearly one a minute.[1]

1 Allowing for those who leave, net foreign migration reached 333,000 in 2007, three times the level of 1997.[2]

2 The total of migrants who have arrived since 1997 is about 3 million[3] (net foreign immigration of 2.67 plus half the latest estimate of 725,000 illegals).[4]

3 In 2007 one in three London residents were born outside the UK.[5]

4 In 2008 one in nine of the UK population was born overseas.[6]

5 Immigration will add nearly 7 million to our population in the next 20 years, mainly in England.[7] That is equivalent to seven times the population of Birmingham.

6 England is now the most crowded country in Europe (apart from Malta)[8] and the fourth most crowded major country in the world.[9]

7 Nearly 40% of household formation in the period 2006-31 will be a result of new immigration - that is 2.5 million extra households.[10]

8 The government's own calculation is that immigration raised production by 0.15% per annum in the ten years to 2006[11] - that works out at 62 pence per head per week.

9 The number of foreign born workers over 16 had doubled since 1997 from 1.9 million to 3.8 million.[12] Of these 2.6 million came from outside the EU.

10 One in seven pupils aged 4-11 does not have English as a first language - amounting to 466,000 children.[13]

11 81% of the public agree that the government should substantially reduce immigration levels to Britain.[14]

Revised April 2009

Updated