New Clause 17 - Migration statistics
Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Bill
3:15 pm
Mr Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight, Conservative)
I am certainly aware that such statistics are published, but I am also aware that the Government repeatedly challenge the statistics published by Migrationwatch UK and the Home Secretary says that he does not have a clue what the answers are to some of the questions that are justifiably asked of him.
New clause 19 considers the Government's movement from a fairly restricted policy on work permits to a more liberal policy. We understand that that change is made in response to demand, but when unemployment in some parts of the United Kingdom is still as high as it regrettably is, it is hard to see that that demand is uniform. Will the Minister project the level of demand for labour in the United Kingdom and make an assessment of that demand so that the public can judge whether it is necessary for work permits to be issued, and for them to be issued in a particular area, or for a particular skill? Recently, there was a significant downturn in IT, yet work permits for IT personnel continued to be issued throughout—I do not know whether they still are.