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keir starmer Urges to tackle ‘dangerous brain drain’ damaging UK economy Just days before next week’s make-or-break Budget The number of Britons leaving the UK is higher than ever before, official figures have revealed.
A total of 257,000 British citizens are thought to have left the country last year – 180,000 more than the initial estimate of just 77,000, according to the figures, which also revealed migration reached A new record high.
In the three years between the end of 2021 and the end of 2024, a total of 344,000 more Britons immigrated than before. National Statistical Office (ONS) updated its methodology.
Amid the claims, the number of people leaving Britain is a blow to Sir Keir just a week before his government’s crucial budget. Downing Street is panicking To Save his Prime Ministership.
Carl Williams, research director of the Center for Policy Studies think tank, said Independent The figures “point to a worrying brain drain, with net migration of British citizens much higher than ever before – and increasing rapidly”.
“This new data supports a lot of anecdotal evidence about young people increasingly moving abroad to places like Dubai and Australia for better wages, lower taxes and cheaper housing,” he said. “Britain urgently needs to stop punishing wealth creators, start building homes and take action to reduce the cost of living, otherwise the loss of some of our most productive workers – and highest taxpayers – will only continue.”
Shadow Chancellor Sir Mel Stride said: “The UK is now facing a dangerous brain drain. Many of our brightest young people, teachers, doctors and innovators are looking abroad – and many wealth creators have already left.”
The Conservative frontbencher said they were “being driven out by Labour’s punitive taxes and policies that stifle ambition. These are the people who power growth and fund our public services, and once they leave, they take opportunity with them. Labor must change course now, before the talent Britain relies on is lost forever.”
Meanwhile the British Medical Association said Independent It was “very concerned” about Britain’s ability to keep doctors in the country. It pointed to a report by the General Medical Council which showed that more than 4,000 doctors left the UK to practice abroad last year.
The figures are in line with claims that 16,500 millionaires will leave Britain this year due to tax changes and a lack of confidence in the faltering economy. The Henley Private Wealth Migration Report estimates that Britain will suffer twice as much as China and 10 times as much as Russia.
A survey conducted for the British Council last year found that almost three-quarters (72 percent) of 18-30-year-olds living in the UK would consider living and working in another country in the short or long term, mainly for better job opportunities and quality of life. The most popular destinations were Australia, the US, Canada and Italy.
The estimates were previously based on the ‘International Traveler Survey’, but its sample size was too small and it had been “stretched beyond its original purpose” so was no longer reliable, the ONS said.
Estimates are now produced using more comprehensive data from the Department for Work and Pensions, which looks at every person with a National Insurance number and can be used to determine their likelihood. migration Situation
Ben Brindle of the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford said: “Old research shows that Britons tend to migrate to other high-income countries, particularly English-speaking countries, and most of them are of working age. However, this is one of the areas of migration where we have the least data on people’s characteristics.”
The ONS also announced that net migration in the year ending March 2023 was 944,000, This is 38,000 more than expected Reached the highest peak previously thought and then fell sharply in 2024 after visa rules were tightened. Net migration is the difference between the number of people moving to the UK for the long term and the number leaving.
The new figures come as Labor Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood faced criticism for unveiling A series of controversial radical measures on Monday designed to discourage asylum seekers And it will be easier to remove those who have no right to live in the country.
But there was good news for Ms Mahmood, as the data also showed that, recently, net migration – the number of people coming to the UK minus the number of people leaving – fell more than before. The figure was 345,000 in the year ending December 2024, down from a previous estimate of 431,000.
Earlier, a Labor peer accused Ms Mahmudoff of using “children as a weapon” in her asylum system proposals.
Lord Alf Dubs, when asked about arguments that asylum seekers are using their children to ‘thwart removals’, told the BBC’s Today programme: “I think that’s a statement of principle – I don’t accept that.”
He added: “To use children as a weapon, as the Home Secretary is doing, I think it’s a poor thing – to be honest, I’m at a loss for words, because my concern was that if we turn away people who come here, what if they have children in the meantime? What should we do with children who are born here, who have gone to school here, who are part of our community, our society? We can’t just say, ‘Oh OK, You go away because your parents don’t claim to be here.”