Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80
- 95)
TUESDAY 16 OCTOBER 2007
Ms Karen Dunnell, Professor Paul Wiles CB and Mr
David Frazer
Q80 Lord Vallance of Tummel:
The long-term assumption for annual net migration to the UK was
recently raised from 145,000 to 190,000 a year. You have touched
on that in your written evidence. Would you say a little bit more
about why that has happened and how it was done and specifically
what confidence limits there are on that.
Ms Dunnell: We produce population projections
every two years and when we do this we also have a look at the
assumptions—because they are not predictions, they are projections,
and so they are projections of the most recent trends. Basically,
those are trends in births, deaths and migration. Of course, when
we did the assumptions for the last round of projections, we had
the information about the levels of net migration during 2004
and 2005, which were the years following the expansion of the
European Union when numbers went up quite considerably. That is
why we raised our assumption, because we have no evidence to indicate
that these levels are going to go down. That is why we raise them,
because that is how the trends have been over the last couple
of years that we were taking into account, as well as changes
in births and deaths.
Q81 Lord Vallance of Tummel:
Confidence limits?
Ms Dunnell: It is very difficult to say. For
the births and deaths part, we are very clear about what the trends
are, but even there we have to make assumptions about whether
the trends will continue in the way that they have done. That
is why, when we do projections, we always produce a high variant
and a low variant. It is quite interesting that this time our
new number was still within the high variant that we had done
the time before. We feel fairly confident about that.
Q82 Lord Paul:
Some of the London councils were upset when their migrant numbers
were reduced because of the new methodology in making the estimates,
which of course reduced their money from the central government.
How do you respond to the councils' criticisms and do you plan
to make further changes to the way regional estimates of migrants
are calculated?
Ms Dunnell: This is a very interesting issue.
It arose, partly anyway, from improving our methodology by using
our large household surveys to work out where immigrants had gone.
We discovered there that a slightly higher proportion of migrants,
slightly over 50%, settled outside London, whereas, before, we
worked on the assumption that slightly over half stayed in London.
So it altered a little bit and created this change in our estimates
of London; nevertheless, still by far the largest numbers of immigrants
settle in London. That is the situation—which is not very
surprising. I suppose what is surprising—and we published
a very interesting article based on the worker registration scheme
just lately to show that—is that, for example, A8 migrants
have moved everywhere in the United Kingdom—as is obvious
when one travels around. Again, we feel that using that information
from the surveys is the correct thing to do. People may arrive
in London, stay not very long, because living costs are very high,
and then move to where their fellows are.
Q83 Lord Layard:
Could I ask you about short-term migration. You have said you
are going to produce a report shortly. Is the concept of a short-term
migrant somebody who, when they arrive, say that they are a short-term
migrant? When you are trying to estimate the number, does that
mean you are taking into account those who become long-term having
said that they were short-term? What is the number that you are
trying to get at? How do you estimate it? Can you tell us what
the number is?
Ms Dunnell: No, I cannot tell you what the number
is because we will be publishing it in a couple of weeks—and
well in time, of course, for your deliberations. This is a very,
very interesting question, of course, because to get the real
answer you have to wait until the people go. From the questions
we ask when people arrive in the port survey: "Why have you
come?" and "How long do you plan to stay?" we have
discovered from the questions when they leave that people change
the purpose for which they came. They may come on holiday and
then get a job or they may come as a student and then work, and
many of them change their minds and decide to stay because it
is so wonderful here. Basically, we are trying to work out how
we can better predict this, which means we have to wait until
they go and then ask them how long they have been here and whether
the length of time they actually stayed was the time they anticipated.
The other complication with short-term migrants is exactly what
you mentioned: what is the concept of it? Is somebody who comes
for a month to do a job as part of their summer holiday or a summer
break or whatever a short-term migrant? These are all the kinds
of things that we are having to think about when we are producing
the estimates that we have done. It is quite complicated because
there is no agreed definition.
Q84 Lord Sheldon:
How long migrants stay in Britain, of course, is a main issue.
One of the figures you have in mind is that 44% of migrants intend
to stay one or two years. What do we know about those who change
their intentions and decide to stay for much longer—which
is, I imagine, quite a number of people.
Ms Dunnell: I am going to get David to say something
about that in a minute because that is one of the great benefits
of the linked information that DWP have been able to create. Again,
these are things that we need to do more research on, but we do
know from our passenger port survey that considerable numbers
of people do change their minds. It is getting the factual information
to back that up that is important. David, would you like to add
to that.
Mr Frazer: The sort of thing we will be looking
to do is to build up longitudinal data on the patterns of what
people do when they are here. I am thinking about how long they
work. If we look at cohorts coming in in particular years, how
many appear to work for short periods and how many work for longer,
that will give ONS better information to feed into the way that
they estimate those kinds of things.
Q85 Lord Sheldon:
Do you have any estimate of how long people overstay their original
intentions?
Ms Dunnell: I am sure we could get you some
information about it. I do not have it, off the top of my head,
but we can certainly send you what we have on that. We have certainly
discovered that they do, so we must know how many and for how
long.
Q86 Lord Sheldon:
Very considerable numbers, obviously.
Ms Dunnell: Yes.
Q87 Chairman:
Over 650,000 people from the eight countries which joined the
EU in May 2004 have since taken up employment in Britain and joined
the Worker Registration Scheme, so I am told. How many can we
expect to stay permanently in the UK and how many have left again
since May 2004? I guess this is all subject to uncertainty but
what is the best you can say.
Professor Wiles: I think I had better take this
because it is largely Home Office work, the Worker Registration
Scheme. I am afraid that the Worker Registration Scheme does not
require people to de-register when they leave the country; in
other words they register when they join the scheme but not when
they leave. WRS was intended to be a measure of A8 migrants entering
the labour market but of course this is a transitional arrangement
any way which will come to an end. It was not designed to measure
net migration from the A8. The direct answer is we do not have
an answer. ONS migration figures based on citizenship, which you
have in the submission, suggest that outmigration (that is leaving
the country) of A8 citizens increased. from 3,000 in the year
to mid-2005 to 16,000 in the following year. .That suggests that
there has been an increase in the outflow. You might expect that
because, of course, it was the latter year that was really the
first year that related to the new A8 accession countries being
there for the first time, so you would expect that to happen.
The problem we have at the moment is that until we have more than
one year's data it is difficult to get a sense of the trend here
about what proportion of those coming are leaving. When we get
more of that data we will be in a position to estimate the trend
in outflow as well as the numbers coming in.
Q88 Chairman:
I wonder if I dare ask this question. We had the Governor of the
Bank of England here some time ago and he made some remarks which
got a lot of publicity about his difficulty in working out economic
trends because he does not know what the labour force is. Is this
is related to this problem?
Professor Wiles: It is a small part of the problem
yes. I think the Governor is referring correctly to the fact that
because we have to give him information from a large number of
sources, as the National Statistician is saying, then he and the
Economic Policy Committee are inevitably faced with a degree of
uncertainty—and this is what you have been exploring with
us for some time—around those numbers. Yes, that is undoubtedly
part of the problem, but this is only a part of that problem.
Ms Dunnell: I think that is also related to
the improvements that we are carrying out on the Labour Force
Survey, where we will cover communal establishments and drop the
requirement to be here six months. That will help that problem
a lot.
Q89 Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach:
Given the answer you have just given, do you have any estimates
for A8 migrants who have come to the UK either as students or
as self-employed persons, who I take it to do not register under
the Workers Registration Scheme.
Professor Wiles: First of all, those who enter
the country on student visas are permitted to work part-time,
which is up to 20 hours a week during term time, and they are
entitled to work full-time during holidays. We presume that many
do—they do not need to seek separate permission to do so;
that is part of their student visa condition—but we do not
have a central record of the work that is undertaken by students
or how many of them do so. The kind of work we can probably all
take a guess at, in terms of sandwich shops, bars and so on, but
we do not have detailed information on that. Those on student
visas are not allowed either to engage in business, to enter the
labour market as a full-time worker, or to become self-employed.
At that point they have to reapply for separate permission to
be in the country.
Q90 Lord Griffiths of Fforestfach:
Do you have any estimates of those in the A8 category who simply
do not register?
Professor Wiles: No. For the Workers Registration
Scheme, I can tell you that workers who do not register and enter
the labour market in this country are subject to fines if they
are caught and those employing them are subject to fines if they
are caught. Of course the Border and Immigration Agency does have
an enforcement section that makes sure that this, amongst other
migration laws, is enforced where possible.
Q91 Lord Lawson of Blaby:
May I ask you a question with which you will not be familiar because
it arises from this very interesting document Statistical Evidence
on the Economic Impact of Immigration which only arrived here
just before you came into the room. One of the interesting things
it shows is that there has been an increase in people leaving
the country of something like 50%. The annual rate has risen by
about 50%, half as much again, over the past ten years. Do you
know anything about what these additional people are? Are they
elderly people going to retire overseas? Are they people of working
age? Are they skilled? Are they unskilled? Is there a brain drain
or are they just people who came here as immigrants and then just
going away again. Who these people are has just as much economic
significance as the numbers.
Ms Dunnell: In our statistical submission that
you have had for about a week or so there is a bit more information
about this, and we can certainly follow it up, but in your question
really you have hinted at the answer. This is a great mixture
of people and the numbers have increased over the years for the
same kinds of reasons that the numbers coming here have increased:
it is just much easier to travel, it is much easier if you go
to come back for short stays and so on and it makes that much
more attractive. Basically, residents of the UK are still going
in large numbers to places like Australia and Canada to work;
many are going to Spain and France to retire; and, of course,
young people are increasingly going away on gap years and maybe
staying longer. It is a huge mixture of people.
Q92 Lord Lawson of Blaby:
I am sure it is, but what I was trying to get at is your best
guess at the relative importance. Economically it makes a big
difference whether they are elderly people, like myself, going
to the "Costa Geriatric" or whether they are enterprising
youngsters who think there is a better future in Australia. There
is an economic difference between those two kinds of migrants.
Ms Dunnell: Yes.
Q93 Lord Lawson of Blaby:
Therefore your best guess of the relative size of this group is
of interest.
Ms Dunnell: I cannot, off the top of my head,
answer that one but I will make sure that the best estimates we
have to answer that we send to you.
Professor Wiles: There is a danger that one
thinks of migration as a one-way process. Of course, enterprising
young people who go somewhere else for a period may eventually
come back, so the extent to which this is an economic benefit
or disbenefit to the country may be slightly different in the
longer term than the shorter term.
Q94 Lord Lamont of Lerwick:
Can you say something about the skills levels of the migrants.
Mr Frazer: The Labour Force Survey tells us
about the skills levels of migrants that have been here for six
months. There is evidence in the written submissions about that.
I suppose it depends on what kind of question you are asking.
We are not sure if you are asking about students who are here
now or who perhaps study here but then go on to work in this country.
For the latter, that is more difficult, because the sources tend
to ask about what qualifications you have if you are a student,
and if you are a worker they will ask about qualifications but
they will not ask about what you did before you worked here and
nor will they ask about your intention in the future. So we do
not have good information from the survey sources at the moment.
Over time, with some of the administration information, it may
be possible to start joining information on education records
and qualifications students have with whether they go on to work
here. That is probably one of the longer-term development and
not one of the key areas we identified in the task force, but
there are some things in the Home Office information.
Professor Wiles: If I might add to that, one
of the problems is that it is difficult to compare qualifications
obtained in different countries and to know what is equivalent
to what. There are some organisations, and probably the premier
one is the National Academic Information Service—which is
a bit of a mouthful—which tries to do just this and it does
it in return for a fee, largely for students looking for accreditation
for entry into UK university institutions. They are probably much
the most reliable source of comparative skills and qualifications
data between migrants. The points-based system that we will be
introducing in the Home Office shortly will use that organisation
to assess qualifications in order to assign points to those applying
for visas to enter this country. That means in the future that
the points-based system for non-EEA migrants will begin to give
a more reliable answer to that question using a generally comparative
understanding of what the relative qualifications are. The other
thing to say, of course, as you probably know, is that the Home
Office has just set up an external Migration Advisory Committee
that is chaired by Professor Metcalfe, who I am sure Lord Layard,
at any rate, knows quite well. They are precisely there to offer
us advice on how the points-based system should apply to the changing
needs of the UK labour market, so this question of qualification
and experience will be one, I am sure, that they will be looking
at.
Q95 Chairman:
Is the points-based system included in the document?
Professor Wiles: Yes. My apologies, my Lord,
that you got that very recently.
Chairman: We have reached the end of
our questions. I am very grateful to you for answering the questions
and for heeding the gentle hint I gave to try to speed things
up. We have slightly overrun our time but it has been very worthwhile.
There have been very useful answers and we are grateful to you
for coming along and giving us the information we need at this
stage of our inquiry.
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