Prime Minister again appears to confuse immigration and net migration figures

Following last week’s Prime Minister’s Questions, Full Fact wrote to the Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, to ask him to correct the record, after he appeared to confuse net migration figures and immigration figures.

We’ve not received a response, but Mr Starmer still seems to be getting the figures mixed up and at least one other minister has made a similar mistake in recent days (though other ministers have referred to the figures accurately).

At today’s PMQs, Mr Starmer claimed of the Conservatives: “They presided over record high levels of immigration. Reached nearly one million.”

And earlier this week, in a statement press released by the Labour party, border security and asylum minister Dame Angela Eagle said: “The Tories lost control of our borders with immigration at a record high of nearly one million”. 

As we explained last week, these figures aren’t quite right. Immigration (the number of people moving to the UK for 12 months or more) actually reached a record high of approximately 1.3 million under the Conservatives, in the year to June 2023. 

The figure of “nearly one million” meanwhile appears to refer to net migration (the number of long-term immigrants to the UK minus the number of long-term emigrants), which in the year to June 2023 is estimated to have reached a record high of approximately 906,000.

On a topic as high-profile and polarising as immigration, we believe it’s important that ministers quote statistics precisely and accurately, and correct inaccurate or misleading claims as soon as possible.

We’ve contacted Dame Angela about this, and will update this blog if we receive a reply.