Previous Press Releases

2010  2009  2008  2007  2006  2005  2004  2003  2002  2001  
December  November  October  September  August  July  June  May  April  March  February  January  

Press Releases for September 2004

September 22, 2004
Demand for overseas marriage review…

September 16, 2004
MigrationWatch comment on the Prime Minister's article: Asylum Removals…

September 8, 2004
Visits from the Accession Countries…

Full Text of Releases : September 2004

---

Demand for overseas marriage review…

A fundamental review of the immigration rules on marriage with partners from overseas is called for in a new report from think-tank Migrationwatch out today. (Read report).

The role of arranged marriages in creating a continuous flow of immigration has been identified as being a significant source of population increase, especially in certain areas of British cities government figures show the flow of spouses and fianc(e)s from the Indian sub-continent alone doubled between 1996 and 2001 to 22,000
a year.

When primary immigration from this region came to an end in the early 1970s it was assumed that family reunion would tail off as families integrated, said Sir Andrew Green Chairman of Migrationwatch.

However this has not occurred and, in practice, the custom of arranged marriage has continued in a process that has become cyclical and self-reinforcing. It is time this was carefully reviewed.

He said that the rules governing marriages from overseas are such as to permit them to be used as a channel of immigration. As a result, young Asians and their families can come under intense pressure to marry someone from their country of origin. This can, and often does, lead to personal unhappiness and divorce.

One effect has been to impede the integration of those already settled here, he said. Another has been to add further to the high concentration of immigrants in certain areas.

An Annex to the Ousley report on Bradford (not published at the time) pointed out that arranged marriages were contributing to very rapid population growth in the city, placing severe demands on public services. And as the Governments Cohesion Panel put it in July 2004; The pace of change (for a variety of reasons) is simply too great in some areas at present. These pressures could increase as the number of British Asians reaching marriageable age increases considerably.

The paper also examines the Danish experience, one of the few countries to face up to this issue by raising the threshold age for marriage and introducing much tighter requirements for housing and maintenance changes that were welcomed by many young Asians.

We have put forward a number of recommendations which we hope will be discussed as part of the debate on this highly sensitive but important subject, said Sir Andrew.

The UK is already a close second to Holland as the most crowded country in Europe and it is clear that many people are very concerned that the present immigration system is failing to control the numbers coming to Britain.

Back to top

---

MigrationWatch comment on the Prime Minister's article: Asylum Removals…

The Prime Ministers article for The Times on 16 September gives an incomplete picture of the position.

The article acknowledges the continued widespread abuse of the system admitting, for example, that 70% of those applying to our ports have destroyed their documents to make their removal more difficult.

But the spin-doctors have played with the numbers in three respects:

1.	The Prime Ministers new "target" for removals is less than the Governments manifesto commitment. Asylum applications are now running at about 40,000 per year, including dependants. Historically, 60% have been refused asylum or permission to stay. So the new target amounts to 24,000 removals a year compared to a manifesto commitment of 30,000 a year which was later abandoned.
2.	The article notes that "in 1996, the number of removals was equivalent to only 20% of unsuccessful claims". It does not admit that average removal rate in the period 1997 2003 was also 20%. Selecting the last two quarters and claiming 50% removal is, therefore, misleading.
3.	Mention is made of the backlog of failed asylum seekers without any indication that the number for whom there is no evidence of departure now exceeds 250,000 (including dependants) in the period 1997 2003.

Commenting, Sir Andrew Green, Chairman, Migrationwatch UK said "At last the Government have acknowledged the scandal that a "system" that costs 2 billion a year results in only one in five failed asylum seekers being removed. Despite this, the Prime Ministers new "target" is likely to be lower than that promised in the 2001 manifesto.

Back to top

---

Visits from the Accession Countries…

Data released by the Office for National Statistics today show that the number of visits from the eight Eastern Europe countries who acceded to the EU this year jumped from 76,000 in June to 191,000 in July. [1]This is over three times the number (61,000) who visited in July, 2003

In total 366,000 people from these countries visited the UK in the 3 months since May and 11%, about 40,000 people, were expecting to stay for more than 3 months.

Commenting Sir Andrew Green, Chairman of Migration Watch UK, said, "The numbers don't show the net number of migrants to the UK as there is no data on those returning to Eastern Europe, but they do point to the probability of a substantial rise in net migration from those countries."

NOTES:
[1] The 8 countries are Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Back to top

---