Much of the public deeply resents the spending priority afforded to migration. We read that the government is being asked to pay yet more money for its hasty and botched cancellation of the Rwanda plan, rubbing salt into wounds when we do not have the deterrent effect of somewhere to send illegal migrants which the government clearly needs. The government pays large sums to the French to stop the boats without conditions and accepts the French have broken their promise to tackle some of the boats in shallow water before they depart when their intentions are clear.The government is paying large sums for hotel accommodation they promised to close down, and paying more to convert older buildings for use as migrant hostels in an attempt to avoid more hotels as illegals continue to arrive. The government is paying top up benefits to migrants, and a full range of benefits to dependents that come to join them. Migrants taking up lower wage employment qualify for subsidised housing, free NHS, free school places and the full range of public services. The press have recently highlighted the costs of providing free English language tuition for recent arrivals. The arrival of a large number of people speaking a wide range of languages has raised language costs in a number of relevant public services.
In 2025-16 the EU was trying to respond to the large numbers of migrants arriving across its borders.They made a proposal that countries that would not take their fair share of these EU arrivals should have to make payments to the countries that did take them. Their calculation suggested that the set up and early year costs of a new low or no pay migrant were 250,000 Euros.
I tried to work out what a similar cost would be for the UK leaving the EU. I saw that the EU figure had plausibility. If many people come then the state does need to build new flats or houses to accommodate them, and these will need to be heavily subsidised with the public sector picking up the initial capital cost. There needs to be more school places and surgery and hospital capacity, with capital costs to increase the capacity of schools and health centres, and with more staff being recruited to man them. Adding more people on a big scale also means putting in more road and rail capacity. Meanwhile the private sector has to spend on more broadband, water, electricity and gas supply.
The case for controlled immigration has been clear and popular with the majority of voters for a long time. The Treasury idea that high levels of migration were fine because they added to GDP was always disbelieved by many of the voters. It is difficult to understand why clever Treasury officials never wanted to highlight the public spending consequences of unrestricted migration when it was bound to have a very visible impact on capital and revenue budgets for key state services and for benefits.
February 1, 2026
Good Morning,
”The Treasury idea that high levels of migration were fine because they added to GDP …”
And there we have it, at last an admission from a former minister that a powerful agency in the Tory government never wanted to reduce immigration, of any kind, and so it occurred.
We must therefore deduce that all the public remonstrations, to ‘stop the boats’ and such was just gaslighting the voter. The truth eventually comes out. It’s shameful more people didn’t speak out at the time.
Reply I did. This was a belief of officials, not Ministers.
February 1, 2026
The phrase “rub the faces of the public in diversity” (often quoted as “rub our noses in diversity”) originated from allegations that the UK Labour government in the early 2000s deliberately promoted mass immigration to change the country’s social makeup and challenge opponents of such policies.
Origin and Context
The Allegation: In 2009, Andrew Neather, a former adviser to Labour ministers Tony Blair and Jack Straw, claimed that immigration policy was intended, in part, to “rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date”.
Political Impact: The claims suggested that this approach was a deliberate,, yet often quiet, policy to transform the UK into a more multicultural society, while publicly focusing on the economic benefits of immigration.
February 1, 2026
Then why didn’t Minister out a stop to it. Tha Cameron government certainly under Osborne thought it was a good idea. And so did Boris. Mrs May signed us up to the UN migration pact. Discuss
February 1, 2026
@Peter Wood. Isn’t the real problem there the use of GDP to measure economic (and the implication is also always, societal) wellbeing?
All our bureaucrats and most politicians think or claim any increase in GDP is good. Wars, criminal damage, pollution spills, traffic accidents all increase GDP. Unskilled immigration is great for GDP. It’s high time we reassessed the official love for GDP, especially nominal GDP.
February 1, 2026
100% agree. I have long thought GDP is a vague and easily manipulated gauge of economic wellbeing. Since it includes all government spending, it will grow with the cost of paying for immigrants and other unproductive expenditure. We need a number that is ‘private sector’ based only, since it is the private sector that pays for the profligacy of government. I wonder what that would show over the last 10 years….
February 1, 2026
If they wanted to “stop the boats” they would. It is obvious that importing these criminal migrants is a deliberate policy: we are “taking our fair share” but the Government (or the last one) daren’t admit it.
February 1, 2026
GDP per capita was not increased. Much like data – garbage in equals garbagr out
February 1, 2026
We have the direct costs then the increases crime, policing, housing, legal, translation, benefit costs for them plus extended families costs then you render the economy far less competitive and this has huge further costs. NET Zero does this too on top of the Trillions it would costs directly.
Somone on Any Questions yesterday asked if HS2 whould ever be finished and was it the biggest waste of money by government recently – to the latter no Net Zero is the larges several £ trillions for zero benefit, the lockdowns and vaccines £600 billion this for huge net harms. HS2 might perhaps be worth about 10% of its £100+ bn cost to build plus all the disruption during the build,
February 1, 2026
The UK government and local authorities are “investing” over £1.5 billion through initiatives like the Future High Streets Fund (over £830 million) and a “Pride in Place” programme to regenerate town centres. Key focus areas include transforming empty shops into residential/business spaces, supporting local heritage, improving public spaces, and boosting high street activity. Key High Street Funding Initiatives
Great plan, tax business by say £3bn waste half on collection costs and administration then invite the same businesses to apply (in an expensive and time consuming process) to get a little bit back with prob. daft strings attached! What a great plan!
February 1, 2026
The situation is quite incomprehensible if one believes the government is working in the interests of the British people of these islands. Clearly it is not. Why not? Because it hates these British people and wants them replaced with migrants of cultures that are not merely different or variations on the same theme but hostile to and inimicable with British culture. It views the burden on taxpayers as reparations and the swamping of public services to the exclusion of native Brits as just punishment for the sins of white people.
Starmer’s Gang much prefers these illegal immigrants to the host population. Its policy announcements are deceits and lies intended to quell the rising anger, but its actions show its true colours. It hates the British. It wants anyone but the British in these Islands.
February 1, 2026
One in four Brits would be better off on benefits than working from the Express this would not surprise me what a crazy tax and benefit system we have!
February 1, 2026
Crazy, a doom loop and totally unsustainable!
Reply As every day you wish to repeat the same criticisms of the previous government which were endlesssly discussed here I am finding it difficult to post any of your pieces. You are quite capable of contributing to discussion of current policy and current government issues but usually decline to do so. I am close to just automatically deleting all your long and repetitious submissions.
February 1, 2026
The NHS only manages to employ 10% of British medical graduates and recruits foreign doctors, nurses and assistants instead. Private adult care homes also recruit foreign staff .These are allowed to bring in many dependents Including children, all of which have to be educated. Older dependents will need medical and adult care, which will no doubt require more care staff. In the area of London where I live I have noticed a large increase of African and Asian hospital and care workers and their schoolchildren.
February 1, 2026
Who hires the illegals?
February 1, 2026
Other illegals.
There are plenty of them now, a parallel society
February 1, 2026
Spot on Lynn
February 1, 2026
I have come to the conclusion over the last few years that government will do as it likes, no matter what the population think.
Our Government for a couple of decades now have bought in policies which hammer the workers, strivers, investors, savers, and those who want to look after themselves and their own families with ever higher taxation, and crippling regulation.
I see the latest study suggests that 6 million working people would now be better off on Benefits, what a bloody fiasco, when the Country desperately needs people to work, to grow the economy, not to subsidise those who can’t be bothered.
February 1, 2026
its worse than that, the state perpetuates large social housing estates originally built to house the workforces of mines, shipyards, steelworks, etc and which have become jobless wastelands since those dominant employers shut. it is pointless having housing without any jobs market within realistic travelling distance. it is only because the state subsidises such social housing that it is still there. if the individuals had any control over their housing subsidy they would have moved long ago to nearer a modern jobs market.
February 1, 2026
Excellent article by US senator John Kennedy today in the telegraph on the folly of starmer’s surrender of the Chagos Islands. Hopefully our US ally will save the UK and the West from this foolish act of left-wing virtue signalling. As ever, we see the costs of a Labour government are incalculable and cause harm for decades after they are kicked out.
February 1, 2026
To my ancient mind what is going on with both the illegal and legal immigration numbers is simply population replacement.
The tens of thousands of aspirational young Britons departing the UK for more favourable pastures overseas are being replaced by immigrants whose knowledge of the English language and customs are minimal or non-existent and they too often have little or no intention of integrating into our society.
The PM gives appears to dislike us and has made it very clear that immigrants have more rights to accommodation, access to medical and dental facilities than do we, the ordinary British citizens. I dread to think where all this is going to end.
February 1, 2026
it needs radical solutions from the democratic process, otherwise we will have civil war. indeed it may already be too late for some of our cities.
February 1, 2026
The democratic process is past finding an answer.
February 1, 2026
I wonder what economic formula these alleged clever people in the Teasury were using to believe immigration adds to our GDP. It doesn’t if it reduces labour productivity which is exactly what has happened since 2000.
They should refer to the ‘labour productivity growth accounting equation’ which makes clear that long-term GDP is a function of increases in the labour force and labour productivity only.
If you increase the former (eg immigration) it will indeed increase GDP. However that increase is dependent on the second factor (labour productivity). If the increase is so large that labour productivity declines long-term GDP growth will decline too which is exactly what has happened.
When you apply historical data to this formula (which is taught on an elite financial services curriculum) you can see its right. Eg labour productivity in 2000 was 4.4% and in 2025 it was -0.6%. GDP has declined over the same period from 4.4% to 1.1% thus long-term GDP went into decline.
We have taken in an ‘excess’ of 12 million migrants (gross) since 2000 and it has turned our labour productivity -ve. Since 2000 we have admitted 18 million migrants (gross). It should have been 6 million (gross), ie its long term average.
The Treasury thinks the excess 12 million is good for growth. Not so, because as it was ‘excess’ it overstaffed Britain, diluted labour productivity which in turn reduced our long-term GDP growth rates. Im not suggesting it was the only factor which reduced GDP (it wasn’t) but it is evident migration only increases long term GDP if it is productive (ie in the right numbers and can sustain historic labour productivity levels too).
Because migration, labour productivity and GDP growth have gone terribly wrong we now need to cap legal migration at its long term average (net 50k per year) so the system is controlled, it needs to be on a needs basis only (so the numbers are optimal and productive) and the migrants need to be the best in the world (so the output is good and productive). The Treasury need to realise that excess migration is bad for growth.
February 1, 2026
They tax GDP, turnover.
They have no interest in profit.
They don’t care about debt and deficit.
February 1, 2026
Should have said, VAT is levied on turnover, not profit. Therefore they want turnover above all. If the Treasury Officials are the consistent in this then we need really strong Ministers in the subject to conquer the Officials.
These are rare people.
If JR had been chancellor instead of Major, our trajectory would have been sooooo different.
February 1, 2026
Starmer got the star joker treatment in China especially when he was literally knocked sideways when he stepped onto the red carpet bristling with a row of fixed bayonets guard of honour!
Clueless at home and like a fish out of water abroad everyone knows he is unable to comprehend how to fix the economy or anything outside of his lawyers chambers.
China and Russia have nothing but contempt for weaklings and especially those who pretend to be their friends or worse don’t stand up for their own country, never mind Hong Kong.
February 1, 2026
As a lawyer doubtless the PM basically simply follows rules and laws made by others.
Amusing, but perhaps worrying, is the way he was treated by the Chinese and the Japanese PM when guiding him around as though he was a doddery old man who didn’t really know where he was or what he was doing.
February 1, 2026
Re “The case for controlled immigration has been clear and popular with the majority of voters for a long time” I don’t think that is true anymore. People don’t trust the state to deliver anything like a sensible low migration policy, and just want a complete fire break for a number of years to rethink the whole thing and the way it is managed and by who.
I don’t think where in the skills spectrum new entrants are makes any difference, if their skills are already in oversupply we don’t want them. If their skills are easily trained into the locals there is no need for them. When their entry discourages locals from being educated and trained in a skill area we don’t need them. We especially don’t need them in the public sector which intentionally creates skills shortages by refusing enough locals to enter training, in order to create an artificial skills shortage, and an excuse for continual immigration.
We want the people who have engineered this situation in the public sector sacking.
And it has come to the time to say that the white working classes now need similar protections to those the Māori get in New Zealand. It is not racist there, and it would not be racist here. In Malaysia there are a lot of properties which are only allowed to be sold to ethnic Malay’s, I used to think that was racist, but nowadays I think that is sensible and we should do similar here.
Those towns and cities which are segregated need fixing, those communities which refuse to integrate should be tackled. Those communities which support terrorists which want harm to the UK should be sanctioned. As a first step we should stop splitting children into different schools depending on which sky pixie their parents claim to believe in.
So sadly John your mild acceptance that something is wrong, and that you need some kind of soap story to tell the public, falls far short of anything acceptable.
February 1, 2026
Well the majority are now scared. Terrified I might say. Justifiably.
It’s a very dangerous thing to have allowed. Very dangerous to deny the British the Rule of Law.
But the political class allied themselves with the world in general against their own nation.
The political class might be the first to establish that it is very dangerous to be ousted from your tribe because they are the only ones who have a genetic interest 8n your survival.
February 1, 2026
Because it is totally without merit and most people imagine that we suffer high levels of migration for other reasons.
Just as in France and Germany where whole native communities are being replaced by immigrants, illegal and otherwise, so it is also in England. The conclusion can only be that this was a deliberate intention.
But what kind of government would impose such a change on their own counties?
The same kind of government that would bring out legislation to restrain, suppress and spy on people for no good reason, making full use of DEI to warp values while destroying the industrial infrastructure.
In such a situation money wasted for no good reason becomes unimportant.
February 1, 2026
It’s the kind of Government which is working towards creating a “new world order” with a One World Government.
That has been the objective for decades, post WW2.
February 1, 2026
Tax employers who use these cheap workers.
Remove entitlement to benefits for any immigrant not working (including spouses why should indigenous couples have to both work to survive if immigrants don’t.)
Leave the UN Refugee convention until it reflects modern day communications.
Add a voluntary tax code hypothecated for refugees so that the “refugees welcome” brigade can pay for their doctrine.
Speedily remove illegals and don’t let in so many legals.
February 1, 2026
+ 1
February 1, 2026
Don’t you understand that the people who use these newly arrived illegals run ‘businesses’ in a parallel society and are probably un known to HMRC?
February 1, 2026
I am referring to legal immigrants in terms of taxation.
Illegals shouldn’t be here nor should they ve working.
February 1, 2026
Nor should they receive any benefit apart from a bed, food & books in a secure camp…..until their country is deemed safe for return
February 2, 2026
agree
February 4, 2026
France? They all come from France.
February 1, 2026
“It is difficult to understand why clever Treasury officials never wanted to highlight the public spending consequences of unrestricted migration when it was bound to have a very visible impact on capital and revenue budgets for key state services and for benefits.”
It’s very simple. Lord Gus O’Donnell who, when Cabinet Secretary, said in 2011: “When I was at the Treasury I argued for the most open door possible to immigration … I think it’s my job to maximise global welfare not national.” Unfortunately it is quite clear that a majority of MPs of all main parties, and hence Parliament, has agreed with this view and consequently have been, and still are, supportive of mass immigration. It is the same with the false ideology that we have a climate crisis and this is caused by burning hydrocarbon fuels which has led to a majority of MPs in all main parties, and hence a Parliamentary majority, supporting the sabotaging of our energy, economy and national security.
February 1, 2026
Original Richard: As long as Sir John continues to regard Treasury officials’ and other civil servants’ actions as strange and puzzling, he will continue to leave you and me wondering why he still doesn’t understand.
February 1, 2026
Schools, hospitals, GP Surgeries etc are all required to cater for the hundreds and thousands of immigrants, legal or otherwise. However it appears the most important facility has been omitted; PRISONS!
February 1, 2026
Much guff and angst in the weekend press about the closure of village pubs, now reaching about 7 a week. Clearly, the public no longer wish to visit their local hostelry for a drink. Alcohol has become unpopular, possibly because of the rising cost of a pint
Conversely, because of a massive boom in supply, global cocaine consumption has more than doubled since 2014 and the cost has fallen dramatically. Headlines about cocaine seizures are ten a penny. Last year, UK police and the Border Force seized the largest quantity of cocaine (12.3 tonnes – estimated street value £2bn) since records began. Total UK consumption is estimated at ~117 tonnes of cocaine annually. That is a staggering amount.
Source; bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn0w4e4e00jo
Overwhelmingly, in the UK cocaine is seen as a middle-class drug, consumed at smart dinner parties by yuppies, City types and increasingly, politicians.
Clearly, people are staying at home, putting it up their nose or smoking it in pipes (‘crack’) instead of supporting their local pub. Maybe the Greens are right, we should decriminalise it so the government could tax it?
February 1, 2026
SG
A prize for the strangest post.from you.
Are you perhaps really that Zac chap?
PS
It isn’t class A drug use closing pubs.
Try reduced disposable incomes, cheap supermarket alcohol prices and easy home delivery of take away drink.and food.
February 1, 2026
@ Sakara Gold some sort of Egyptian beer, yes agreed, huge amount of cocaine!
As a thought, our civilisation has not only dominated every known habitat on Earth, but can fling rockets and probes into orbit around distant planets.
On the other hand, it has proved quite powerless against the problem of addiction, whether alcohol, tobacco, cocaine etc…
Curious…
February 1, 2026
In this diary, and among almost all politicians the talk is almost exclusively about the consequences of illegal migration both in the U.K. and Europe. They are seen as lamped rabbits.
As far as it involves the U.K. these illegals are incentivised to come. The answer is to disincentivise them. Build one hutted POW style encampment on West Falkland. Ship 5000 illegals under military supervision to it for a road building programme. Make it abundantly clear to those in the Calais queue via social media that this is the immediate response to illegal crossings. End of crossings.
Suggest to the estimated 2,000,000 illegals currently in the U.K. that this is their future unless they depart the UK, ASAP. Expand our embassy in Rome to include an asylum vetting centre for genuine refugees to revert our historic intake to about 30,000 PA.
Exclude our ambulance chasing legal profession from their income stream by leaving the ECHR and revoking its Blairite Trojan Horse human rights legislation from the UK statute book.
I would anticipate that this would end the problem. If you sold the problem like Pattons 1944 third army in Kent, prior to the D Day invasion you might not have to actually build anything in West Falkland. Such is thinking outside the box. Are our current politicians good for that way of thinking, sadly no.
February 1, 2026
The Establishment WANTS the criminal migrants here. That is why they are doing nothing to stop them coming and everything to incentivise it.
February 1, 2026
Sooner or later everyone is going to have to accept that fact.
Then we will have to decide what we think of the establishment, whether we need them or not.
February 1, 2026
Unfortunately Agricola, as we all know this will not happen, just like many other sensible options, it would not even be considered.
Indeed we could go further and build a proper Port there ready for oil and gas exploration and supplies, but that will not happen either.
Much easier and simpler to just raise taxes on those who work, and give it to those who will not bother.
February 1, 2026
We have an empty army camp in the Hebrides ….use that
February 1, 2026
Allowing students to work while studying creates low wages
Allowing ex-students to remain in the UK to work creates low wages
Allowing so called sponsored labour creates low wages
Allowing immigrant escorting families to work creates low wages
Allowing illegal immigrants to work in black market creates low wages
…..and they all get social benefits
February 1, 2026
Forcing married women, especially mothers, into the workplace and to abandon their children to be brought up collectively also produces low wages.
February 1, 2026
Immigration has for years been a running sore for the UK. It is a classic case of ignoring the will of the people who our MPs are supposed to represent. We now need a period of no immigration giving time to rethink our policies, and sort out the people who are already here.
You can have a Christian culture or a multicultural culture, but they can’t co-exist. Within a few years, Islam will bring a major clash of those cultures. Our soft, liberal, weak governments of the last twenty-five years have laid the ground for a major culture clash. We don’t want an American-type solution, but we do need proper government action to stop illegal immigration and return illegal immigrants who are already here.
Is Reform tough enough to do it?
February 1, 2026
No.
February 1, 2026
The ruling classes like appeasement, they don’t want critical review of cultures committing gang rape and murder, they don’t want to push back against the mass import of cheap workers from India, they intellectually want to be friends with everyone. The only people they are prepared to be hard with are the white working classes. Even the Labour party which was setup to help the British white working classes now routinely treat them harshly, so the white working class have no real representation in the political system. The only white working classes who get air time on the main stream media are laughable stereotypes, educated people from that background are actively hidden by the system. There is open discrimination and harassment against anyone with a working class accent or postcode, in a way which would be tackled in court if it was against any other group.
Far too many people in the CPS, in the home office dealing with immigration, in the NHS, and so on are actively anti British. There are a number of cases where this is absolutely obvious and proven, and nothing is being done to tackle it.
Open honest discussion of the realities of all this is massively supressed in the UK by a lot of anti free speech action by the state.
February 1, 2026
The economic model I saw on the benefits of immigration completely left out the immediate capital cost of providing another place on the roads etc. It only took into account ongoing state expenditure.
So the €250,000 per immigrant figure shows the EU on this occasion are calculating things more correctly.
The UK figure would be higher than this, because everything is expensive here.
Also we have access to benefits and NHS without any social security contribution record being required. This is very different to EU countries.
February 1, 2026
yep they never count the cost of the benefits for the Brit they displaced from the workforce either
February 2, 2026
it always amazes me that some of the most corrupt and untrustworthy people I personally know, from seeing them up close over long periods, are recent immigrants, and yet the police welcomed them in as special constables. which gives them a veneer of respectability. this is a particularly dysfunctional aspect of UK society I have not got me head entirely around.
February 2, 2026
and almost certainly we have the same kinds of people in the home office, senior layers of the NHS, and so on.
February 3, 2026
We certainly do have. One illegal migrant was actually an Immigration Officer currently arraigned in the High Court.
Should the Government not be publicly humiliated (if that is still possible) and fined for employing and illegal immigrant?