Net migration in the tens of thousands? If only!
The way Brexit is going, I bet it will soon be in negative territory for the following reasons:
- Many EU citizens will go home or move to other EU countries where they feel welcome.
- Many UK citizens will follow their jobs abroad.
- When the UK economy collapses, the number of people wanting to come here will fall like a stone.
- When UK universities lose many of their best staff because of the removal of EU funding, foreign students will go elsewhere.
(Of course some UK pensioners will return from abroad, too, but there are many more EU citizens in the UK than UK citizens in the the rest of the EU, so that won’t cancel out anything.)
Obviously, this is going to be disastrous, and soon people will start waxing poetically about the good old days when immigration was high and life was good.
However, as a result May will easily meet her net migration target. Unless she cancels Brexit, of course – so the fact she’s reaffirming the net migration commitment is yet another sign she’s hellbent on a hard Brexit.
Seems unlikely – half of immigration isn’t EU-based, and the UK, even a crappy diminished brexit version, is still a great step up for most of the planet’s population.
Obviously you can get as many immigrants as you want in this world – there are plenty of desperately poor people. However, Theresa May has made it extremely hard to get a visa, so those people won’t get it.
If I’m right, the (r-)UK might loosen up the criteria once net migration falls below 0, but I think that would need to happen first.