Border control, Calais. Photo Gary Perkin/shutterstock.com
The Home Office reports that rising numbers of migrants have come to Britain since the introduction of post-Brexit immigration rules. In 2021, the government granted 239,987 work-related visas – 25 per cent higher than 2019 (192,559) and a 110 per cent increase on 2020 (114,528 visas).
The Home Office says that the biggest growth in visa numbers was for what it calls skilled workers. But there were year-on-year rises, too, for temporary workers (mostly seasonal workers) and other visas.
The figures also revealed that applications from EU citizens for UK citizenship were higher than they were in 2019, before the Brexit agreements came into force.
Later in March, Home Secretary Priti Patel told the House of Commons that the government “has taken back control of legal immigration”. Ignoring the numbers produced by her own department showing sky-high legal immigration, she went on to talk almost exclusively about her Rwanda scheme for asylum seekers.