Still waiting for evidence on Romanian and Bulgarian migration

The Express yesterday referred to "the huge influx" of Romanian and Bulgarian nationals who've come to the UK since temporary immigration restrictions were lifted on 1 January.

Last year there was a great deal of speculation over how many more would actually come to the UK as a result, although there were no official estimates of the likely scale of immigration.

In spite of the Express' claim, there are still no official figures yet for how many have come. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) set out in January when the relevant data will become available, though it makes clear that no single dataset can answer the whole question.

We'll find out next week how many more Romanian and Bulgarian nationals have found work since January, though this can also include people who've been in the country for longer.

Migration figures from the ONS estimate how many migrants come to the UK and where from, but there is a lag between when this data is collected and when it is published. We have to wait until August this year to find out how many came in the year to March 2014, so even then the picture will be limited.

Finally, if we wanted to know how the population of Romanian and Bulgarian-born people in the UK has changed since the restrictions were lifted, we'll have to wait till August 2015 for the estimates to be published.