More than 1.3m Eastern Europeans living in Britain

THE number of Eastern European migrants in the UK is around 100 times greater than British people living in the same eight nations on the continent, figures have shown.

Around 1.3million citizens of countries including Poland, Czech Republic and Lithuania are living in the UK compared with the 14,000 British citizens residing abroad in the states that joined the European Union in 2004.

More than 40 per cent of the UK nationals live in the Czech Republic, the survey found. Poland accounts for the highest number of nationals from the eight countries in the UK with around 813,000 people making their life here – the largest population of any overseas country.

The figures were disclosed in an Office for National Statistics (ONS) report on migration between the UK and the so-called EU8 countries, which also include Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Estonia and Latvia.

The ONS compiled information on the number of EU nationals living in the UK as it prepares for Brexit in an attempt to inform discussions on how citizenship rights will work

The findings echo previous research that showed Poland has overtaken India for the first time as the most common overseas country of birth.

Statistics also suggest there has been a rise in the number of overseas nationals claiming the UK state pension from countries in the region. Figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show there were around 6,000 people in EU8 countries receiving a pension at the end of last year.

Statisticians reported that the majority of EU8 nationals in the UK are of working age. On average, 80 per cent of those aged 16 to 64 were employed when they were surveyed between 2013 and 2015. EU8 citizens made up 3 per cent of the national workforce.