How did 'taking back control' of borders become record-high net migration?

• Special visa routes for people from Ukraine and Hong Kong contributed 172,000 people, and over 200,000 are international students and their dependants.
• People seeking asylum are now included (adding 72,000 to the total), but seasonal agricultural workers (38,000 visas in 2022) are excluded.
• Read more:
  Net migration: how an unreachable target came to shape Britain

  It’s notable that these figures come just years after government promises to “take back control” of the UK’s borders.

• On this we can see fairly direct impacts in the latest figures, with less migration from the EU and even net outflows of European citizens.

Quality of work

• They restrict worker rights – to move employers, or to have access to public services – all things that make migrants more vulnerable to exploitation.
• Indeed, the problems are already becoming clear in the agricultural sector where the evidence of exploitation is growing.
• But the addiction is actually to a labour market which has little or no protection for workers, and no strategy to improve standards and the quality of work.
• While this looks like it benefits the UK economy, it is short term, further segments the labour market, criminalises informal work, and opens large numbers of people to the risks of exploitation and modern slavery.