... as arrivals from outside the EU reach all-time peak

MIGrATION from outside europe swelled the population by 282,000 last year – the highest level on record, official figures showed yesterday.

The rise, the biggest since the nationality of arrivals was first collected in 1975, was largely a result of growing numbers of students, especially from China and India.

It came against a background of falling numbers of eU citizens coming to Britain since the 2016 Brexit vote.

Overall the assessment by the Office for National statistics meant net migration – the key figure showing the effect on population numbers after immigration and emigration are counted – stood at 270,000 in the year to December 2019. The net migration level was the highest since 2015.

The coronavirus outbreak will transform the pattern for this year.

But in the long term numbers of migrants from outside the eU are likely to rise under the Government’s planned new pointsbased immigration system. This allows for an extra 50,000 annual incomers from outside europe.

separate figures released by the home Office yesterday showed in the year to March there was a dramatic rise in National Insurance numbers issued to those coming in from outside the eU.

The NI numbers, necessary for anyone who wants to work legally or claim benefits, jumped 45 per cent to 326,000 for noneU citizens over the 12 months.

Many were given to family members of people already established in Britain.

Jay Lindop, of the ONs, said: ‘Overall migration levels have remained broadly stable in recent years, but new patterns have emerged for eU and noneU migrants since 2016.

‘For the year ending December 2019, non-eU migration was at the highest level we have seen, driven by a rise in students from China and India, while the number of people arriving from eU countries for work has steadily fallen.’

Dr Ben Greening, of the MigrationWatch UK think-tank, said: ‘Non-eU arrivals have reached new record levels and risk going up by leaps and bounds, once the pandemic has passed, should the points-based system be enacted.

‘ Coronavirus has already knocked out more than twice as many jobs as the financial crisis, according to one estimate.

‘It is totally wrong in these tough times to scrap crucial safeguards for UK workers and to uncap work permits so that employers can hire an unlimited number of cheaper workers from overseas.’ The ONs figures showed in the year to the end of 2019 there were 677,000 people who came from abroad to live in Britain for more than a year.

some 60,000 more British citizens left the country than came back from abroad, an outflow that meant the overall net migration total was lower than the 282,000 net migration figure for non-eU citizens.

some 49,000 more eU citizens arrived in the UK than left.

The share of migrants in the population has roughly doubled since 2004 – when Tony Blair’s government opened the labour market to eastern europe.