23rd Jan 12
More than 370,000 migrants on benefits
by Harry Oldfield
In line for review: study finds many immigrants claiming benefits ilegally
In line for review: study finds many immigrants claiming benefits ilegally
Work-related benefits last year were being claimed by over 370,000 migrants who initially came to Britain to work, visit or study, found recent research.
The government matched border control, tax and benefit records from 2011. Studying a sample of 9,000 claimants of particular nationalities, they discovered that 2,000 were claiming benefits illegally. Employment Minister Chris Grayling pointed out that the majority of claims were perfectly legitimate, but that the full picture was not clear yet.
Before the election of the coalition government the nationality of those claiming benefits was not recorded. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), HM Revenue and Customs and the UK Border Agency carried out the first detailed data-matching.
They found that as of February last year, 371,000 people – out of 5.5 million overall – claiming work-age benefits (jobseeker’s allowance, carer’s allowance, income support, disability allowance among others) were non-UK nationals upon originally applying for a National Insurance Number. Some 258,000 of these were not from the European Economic Area (EEA).
Of the total figure, 54 per cent were now citizens of the UK, and the majority of others possessed an immigration status which meant they were eligible to claim benefits.
Follow-up research looked at 9,000 people in the UK who were non-EEA nationals and found that three-quarters of these people’s records could be matched. Of those, 98 per cent were entitled to claim benefits, although two per cent appeared to not be in possession of a “lawful immigration status”. The DWP said the small amount of cases is being looked into.
The government also revealed that it was considering ways to get a record of nationality “at source” and looking at ways to improve the tracking of claimants’ immigration status. The employment minister said that the majority of claimants were breaking no rules, and insisted the government was not scaremongering. Mr Grayling said that he hoped to reduce net migration as well as make sure the British system did not lure “benefit tourists”.
Earlier in January the government’s official migration advisers said there was a connection between immigration from beyond the European Union and redundancies among UK workers. The Migration Advisory Committee revealed that there were 23 fewer British jobs for every 100 non-EU migrants. However, a separate study by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) showed that immigration did not have much impact.
MigrationWatch UK, a campaign group which pushes for tougher immigration controls, described the evidence as “unclear”, but said that something was obviously not right. Sir Andrew Green, the group’s chairman, said that he is extremely happy that ministers responsible for the situation are finally acknowledging that the immigration system in the UK is in a mess and that something needs to be done about it.
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