Cross-party group calls for immigration cap

Labour MP Frank Field has launched a new all-party parliamentary group calling for significant cuts in immigration.

The former minister wants a policy of balanced migration, under which immigration levels are capped in line with the number of emigrants to maintain a stable UK population over time.

Co-chairman and a former Conservative minister Nicholas Soames, said ministers should slash the number of non-EU migrants allowed to settle permanently in the UK after coming here to work for four years.

Soames and Field have pointed to results from a YouGov poll suggesting that substantial reductions in immigration are backed by voters of all parties as well as Britain's existing ethnic minorities.

Responding to the poll, Field said: "The results show not only overwhelming support but that newly-arrived black and white British citizens wish to be given an opportunity of supporting a balanced migration approach in the polls at the next general election."

The two MPs said the government's current points-based system for non-EU migrants selected foreign workers who were most useful to the economy, but did not limit immigration.

They said only a tiny minority of migrants should be allowed to remain in Britain after the expiry of four-year work permits.

Anyone wishing to settle permanently after that time would be subjected to a further points system, with a government-set annual cap on the number allowed to stay.

Genuine asylum seekers, foreign students and spouses with partners overseas would be exempt from the limit, as would people from the European Economic Area, who are already allowed to live and work in Britain.

Balanced migration could stabilise the UK's population at about 65 million by 2050, compared to 78.6 million if current trends continue, said the group.

The group, which includes Britain's first Muslim peer Lord Ahmed and former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Carey, believe their proposals would greatly reduce pressures on British public services, infrastructure and the environment and enable the economy to remain competitive.

Field said many hard-pressed families were now living in societies they could "barely recognise" due to an "unprecedented wave" of immigration over the past decade.

"One group that has disproportionately borne the cost of such immigration, through pressure on wages, longer waiting lists for decent housing and increased demand for public services, has been lower-paid black and white Britons," he said.

"This group of our population has also often experienced a transformation of their neighbourhoods from settled working-class communities to societies which they can barely recognise."

Soames added: "We need to strike the right balance between creating a competitive economy with a flexible workforce, and relieving the burdens that uncontrolled immigration is placing upon our society.

"Balanced migration would not prevent people from coming to work in the UK for a few years, but it would control the number of people allowed to settle permanently. We propose this as a basis for debate and discussion on a critical issue that must be tackled - and soon."

But immigration minister Liam Byrne effectively ruled out calls for a cap.

"Our tough new points system plus our plans for newcomers to earn their citizenship will reduce overall numbers of economic migrants coming to Britain, and the numbers awarded permanent settlement," he said.

"Crucially the points system means only the migrants with the skills Britain needs can come - and no more. Unlike made-up quotas, this stops Government cutting business off from the skills it needs when they need them."

The Conservatives welcomed the formation of the group. Shadow home secretary Dominic Grieve said: "We have made our own proposals to set an annual limit on economic immigration, because we want to reduce the pressure on our public services which has been caused by the uncontrolled immigration levels of recent years."