Emigration soars as Britons desert the UK

Britain is experiencing the greatest exodus of its own nationals in recent history while immigration is at unprecedented levels, new figures show. Last year, 207,000 British citizens - one every three minutes - left the country while 510,000 foreigners arrived to stay for a year or more. The British made up more than half of the 400,000 moving abroad - yet only 14 per cent of immigrants were UK nationals coming home. The figures do not include hundreds of thousands of east Europeans who have come to work in Britain in the past two years. This is because most are coming for less than 12 months and do not show up on the statistics.

The figures from the Office for National Statistics suggest that only one sixth of the immigrants in 2006 were from the states that joined the EU in 2004. The biggest influx was from the New Commonwealth - India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka - with more than 200,000.

Since Labour came to power in 1997, 1.8m British people have left but only 979,000 have returned, Over the same period, 3.9m foreign nationals have come to Britain while 1.6m have left. More than 50 per cent of the British emigrants moved to just four countries in 2006 - Australia, New Zealand, France and Spain. Eight in every 100 went to the USA.

The ONS said that overall last year there were 591,000 immigrants to the UK and 400,000 emigrants, both the highest figures ever recorded. Net immigration - the difference between those leaving and arriving - was 191,000.

The departure of so many Britons is exacerbating the demographic and cultural changes caused by high levels of immigration. Recent figures showed that despite high levels of emigration and a low birth rate, the population is still growing rapidly because of immigration. It is growing by the equivalent to a city the size of Bristol every year. Sir Andrew Green, chairman of Migrationwatch, said: "Two thirds of yet another record level of arrivals come from outside the EU. They could and should be subject to much tighter controls." He added: ''This gives the lie to claims that nothing effective can be done about immigration because of our membership of the EU."

Damian Green, the Conservative spokesman, said: "These figures prove that immigration is still running at unsustainably high levels. "This is the direct result of the Government's 'open door' approach which has totally failed to consider the impact of immigration on public services, housing and community cohesion." Sir Simon Milton, chairman of the Local Government Association, said the Government had no clear idea of where all the immigrants were going and their impact on services. "No-one has a real grasp of where or for how long migrants are settling so much-needed funding for local services isn't getting to the right places," he said. "The speed and scale of migration combined with the shortcomings of official population figures is placing pressure on funding for services like children's services and housing. ''This can even lead to unnecessary tension and conflict."

While immigration is the highest in the country's history, the emigration of UK nationals is running at its greatest level since before the First World War. Little research has been done into the reasons for the exodus of Britons, though it appears more are going abroad to retire though many younger people are leaving to work. A study last year by the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) suggested that one in 12 UK nationals may now be living abroad. There are 250,000 second homes owned by British nationals in France alone. Surveys indicate that another one million are set to pack their bags for good over the next five years and a further 500,000 live abroad for part of the year.

Danny Sriskandarajah, of the IPPR, said: "The UK is seeing revolving turnstiles and not over-run floodgates. "More people are on the move than ever before, with a million emigrants and immigrants crossing our borders last year." He added: "It is also clear that immigration is an economic phenomenon, with almost half of those immigrating and emigrating doing so for work-related reasons."

More British live abroad than any other nationality. There are 41 countries with more than 10,000 British living there and another 71 countries with more than 1,000. The levels of emigration are now back to those last seen in the late-1950s and early 1960s, when the "10 pound Poms" left in their droves for Australia, enticed by subsidised travel and settlement.

The last exodus on a similar scale was before 1914, when the outflow was running at 300,000 per annum and more young men were leaving the country every year than died on the battlefields of Europe. Between 1853 and 1913, more than 13 million British citizens left, mainly for North America, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. Some came back; but cumulative net emigration was equivalent to 13 per cent of the population, mostly those aged between 18 and 45. However, there was little immigration then: the population grew because of a high birth rate.

The difference of around three million between the emigration of British nationals and immigration of foreigners represents a five per cent turnover of the entire population in ten years. Previous immigrations did not exceed one per cent over fifty years. This turnaround in population has inevitably changed its ethnic composition. Over the last 20 years, the white British population has decreased slightly while the number of ethnic minority Britons has doubled. Looking ahead to the next 10 years, the white ethnic group will remain static while the number of Asian non-dependents alone will increase from 1.5 to 2.5 million

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