''Not sensible'' to predict immigrant influx

25 January 2013

There are so many variables that it is simply not sensible to start to estimate how many people will come into the UK from Romania and Bulgaria this time next year, the immigration minister Mark Harper has said.

Earlier in the month, Migration Watch UK predicted that when transitional controls are lifted there could be between 30,000 and 70,000 coming into Britain – but parliament was told there could be around a third of a million. In all, 29m Bulgarians and Romanians will have the right to move wherever they like in the European Union.

The coalition is said to be wary that the last Labour government predicted in 2004 there would be no more than 13,000 immigrants coming into the UK from Poland and other eastern European countries – instead, over 1m came to Britain.

Labour has now accused Harper of attempting to cover up a report which predicted what impact an influx from Romania and Bulgaria could have on the UK economy, public services and infrastructure. The party said that by not releasing the figures the government "will lose the trust of the British people".

Telling the BBC that speculating about numbers was "not a very sensible thing to do" because "the previous government made a forecast which turned out to be completely wrong", Harper said: "There are so many variables. There are eight other European countries which have transitional controls in place which will remove them at the same time."

He added: "The problem is very simple. You make a forecast and it ends up being based on a whole set of assumptions. You don't know exactly what's going to happen."