Hours after official data showed net migration had reached a record of more than 900,000 in the year to June 2023, much higher than original estimates, Starmer called a news conference to spell out his determination to reduce the numbers, which he blamed on the policies of the former Conservative government.
High levels of immigration have become a hot-button issue in the UK. Voters worry that strained public services cannot cope with such large influxes of people, while sectors such as healthcare say they cannot function without foreign workers.
“A failure on this scale isn’t just bad luck… No, this is a different order of failure… Brexit was used for that purpose to turn the UK into a ‘one nation experiment’ in open borders,” Starmer told the press conference, referring to the UK’s 2016 decision to leave the European Union.
“Where we find clear evidence of sectors that are over-reliant on immigration, we will reform the Points Based System and make sure that applications for the relevant visa routes, whether it’s the skilled worker route or the shortage occupation list, will now come with new expectations on training people here in our country.”
If businesses do not “play ball”, he said, they will be banned from hiring overseas workers.
Introduced in 2021 by the Conservatives following Brexit, the points-based immigration system assigns points for specific skills and qualifications and only grant visas to those who have enough points.
Surge in numbers
Earlier on Thursday, data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed net migration of 906,000 for the year to the end of June 2023, revised up from a previous estimate of 740,000.
Numbers did fall 20% to 728,000 for the year to the end of June 2024, the ONS said, driven by declining numbers of dependants coming with those on study visas after the previous Conservative government changed the rules.
The big jump in the 2023 figure was attributed to more available data, more information on Ukraine visas and improvements to how it estimates migration, the ONS said.
High levels of legal migration in 2016 were one of the driving forces behind the UK’s vote to leave the EU.
While post-Brexit changes to visas saw a sharp drop in the number of EU migrants to the UK, new work visa rules led to a surge in immigration from India, Nigeria and Pakistan, often to fill health and social care vacancies.