Leaving The EU Won’t Solve Immigration Problems

Immigration into the UK is high and stands at 323,000 per year. This annual number = 0.50% of our current population.
323,000 can be split into:
172,000 EU nationals
151,000 from Asia, Africa, Americas etc
Many people think we should reduce immigration and some people think that leaving the EU is the best way to do this.
But let's think about this carefully...
If we vote to leave the EU then we can reduce immigration from the EU but not from Asia, Africa, the Americas etc. And we definitely do need to keep at least some (say half) of that EU immigration - in order to satisfy demand for skills in essential things like hospitals and agriculture.
So, if we leave the EU and reduce immigration of EU nationals to the UK by say 50% then overall immigration will fall from 323,000 per year to 237,000 per year. Note that leaving the EU would make no difference to the numbers of asylum seekers coming to the UK.
To put these numbers into context:
Current immigration total = 0.50% of population
Potential post Brexit immigration total = 0.36% of population.
So voting to leave the EU will potentially reduce total immigration by an amount = 0.14% of population. And all of that reduction will be from EU nationals. Note that immigration from Asia, Africa and the Americas will continue as before as well as the number of asylum seekers.
Remember as well that voting to leave the EU will introduce massive uncertainties and the world's most credible organisations like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Bank of England, TUC & OECD warn us that leaving the EU will make us significantly poorer.
So what do you think? The only conclusion I can draw here is as follows:
- if you want to keep Asian, African & American immigration at the same rate
- and reduce EU immigration by an amount = 0.14% of our population
- but be significantly poorer
Then you should vote to leave the EU.
I certainly won't be voting to leave the EU because I think it will make us poorer and will make little difference to immigration.
Please like and share this post if you agree.
Thanks
Andy Preston