The facts on immigration versus the right-wing spin

According to some social media warriors, Britain’s economic woes are caused not by billionaires, but by immigrants. Although if you believe everything you read on social media, you’ve probably already given your bank details to earn £££s in Bitcoin.

Still, a lie is halfway round the internet before the truth has even got its boots on, so here are some answers I gave to anti-immigrant posts.

The facts on immigration versus the right-wing spin

“Immigrants are overloading the NHS”

If you meet an immigrant in the NHS, the chances are it’s the person looking after you.

Facts: Nearly one in five NHS staff are foreign nationals. In England, as of June 2023, 264,822 NHS staff, or 18.7%, reported a non-British nationality.

“Economic migrants cost the NHS billions and are bankrupting the NHS”

So-called ‘legal’ immigrants to the UK pay £1,035 a year NHS surcharge, plus a £2,885 immigration fee. They also pay visa fees between £710 and £1,639. In total, it costs from £11,200 to £38,000 to settle in the UK.

Whereas, for just £13 billion of PFI investment, the NHS has been landed with an £80 billion bill. It’s not immigrants that are the problem, it’s the megarich siphoning money off all of us.

It’s worth noting that British people get free healthcare in many countries around the world, including Spain, for example.

Economic migrants make a net contribution to the UK economy. For example, overseas students contributed £41.9 billion in 2021/2022. Without them, our universities would go broke overnight.

Far from the ‘luxury life on benefits’ the right-wing media and politicians present

“Illegal immigrants are jumping waiting lists”

Undocumented migrants do not get free NHS treatment in hospitals. Without proof of residence, they will not be treated. So it is not possible to jump any queues for anything.

“Immigrants are living in luxury on benefits”

An asylum seeker gets £8.86 a week if their accommodation provides food. That has to pay for travel, clothes, toiletries, stamps, phone calls and anything else.

If their accommodation does not pay for food, they get £49.18 a week to pay for everything, including food. This is half the rate of universal credit, which itself is not enough to live on.

Undocumented migrants receive nothing. They have no recourse to public funds, and can be sent to detention centres. They can claim no benefits of any kind.

“We are overrun by millions of boat people”

Between 2010 and 2023, no more than 85,000 people were refused asylum and not recorded as leaving the country. It is likely that some of those people left but their exit was not recorded, as it could not be matched against their arrival. So the actual number is likely to be lower than 85,000.

Official data show that 166,000 people applied for asylum between 2010 and 2023 but were refused protection, taking into account appeals. Of these, around 82,000 were recorded as having left the UK via enforced or voluntary return by 30 June 2024.

The majority of undocumented migrants in the UK arrived legally and completed the paperwork. They have likely overstayed after their visa ran out.

Rights under the Refugee Convention often conveniently glossed over

“Migrants should stop in the first safe country”

Under international law, every person in the world has the right to apply for asylum if they are fleeing conflict or persecution. The 1951 Refugee Convention does not impose any requirement as to where asylum seekers must go.

The European Union implemented the ‘Dublin System’ that said whichever country first an asylum seeker first registered would continue that person’s claim, wherever they were in the EU. Some people confuse this – deliberately or otherwise – with the “first safe country” myth. Britain has left the EU, so this does not apply to the UK anymore.

Most refugees do seek shelter in neighbouring countries, or even elsewhere with a country. Syrian has 7.4 million internally displaced people. 2.8 million Syrians are in Turkey, 0.8 million in Lebanon, 0.6 million in Jordan, and many more throughout the Middle East. Just 0.02 million Syrians (20,000 people) were resettled in the UK between 2014 and 2020.

“We can’t afford anything because there are too many immigrants”

Overseas students contribute a whopping £41.9 billion to the UK economy annually. They cost the public services £4.4 billion. That’s a net economic benefit of £37.4 billion. In context, Britain’s total public expenditure on the entire education system was £99.4 billion for the same year. Without overseas students our universities will go bust. (2021/2 figures, rounded to the nearest 0.1 billion.)

Of course, a lot of people are not interested in facts. I was actually asked this:

Would you let an immigrant live in your house?

I replied asking if he would let a homeless veteran live in his house. He said no, he didn’t have room.

I added:

I do not run into burning buildings or perform surgery on people either. I pay my taxes so skilled people with the proper equipment can do that job on my behalf. But my next-door neighbour is an Iraqi refugee, and I like him.

Tens of thousands of British people did open their homes to Ukrainian refugees. By July 2024, 54% of all refugees in the UK were Ukrainian. The number of Ukrainian refugees who arrived in the UK in 2022 was around the same as the number of people granted refuge in the UK from all countries, in total, between 2014 and 2021.

Featured image via the Canary