Eighty-two per cent of population growth is due to immigration, and if the government doesn’t get to grips with mass migration, not only is it going to cause major problems, but you’ll see another uprising like Brexit because the people have consistently said they didn’t want high immigration and they’ve consistently had it forced upon them, Bow Group chairman Ben Harris-Quinney has warned.

Ben Harris-Quinney made the remarks in response to the release of the latest official statistics revealing that more than 1 million foreign nationals were offered visas to live, study, and work in the UK last year, up from the pre-pandemic high of more than 740,000 and the highest figure on record. This came after Leave campaigners like the current Prime Minister Boris Johnson had pledged to ‘take back control’ of immigration after Brexit.

Mr Harris-Quinney told Ian Collins on Talk TV: “The concern of the British public for the last two decades has been on the sheer scale of immigration. For quite a long time, roughly one million people a year have been entering this country. 82 per cent of our population growth is down to immigration.

“That creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, because our population is growing quickly, it creates a demand for jobs that wouldn’t be there if it wasn’t for immigration. So the argument that is used – we need immigration to fill jobs – ignores the fact that immigration is causing most of our population growth, and therefore that demand.”

Criticising past and present governments from both sides of the political aisle for failing to act on the will of the people on getting migration under control, Mr Harris-Quinney said: “The public has consistently said that they are opposed to mass immigration, and that has consistently been ignored by successive governments. It was the major driver behind the Brexit vote and I think people are going to realise this government has passed Brexit but they’ve actually increased immigration numbers.”

“This government lets in not only more people every year than the last Labour government, but more people every year than any government in history and it is simply unsustainable,” the Bow Group chairman added.

Harris-Quinney said: “Whatever metric you use, the numbers rise year on year… but the general policy of successive governments has been to ignore the public concern on immigration and to bring in more and more people because the economy is addicted to cheap labour. The big corporates that tend to have the ear of the government want these people to keep coming in in the levels they are. But the majority of the public don’t, and it’s quite extraordinary that’s being ignored.”

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