Suella Braverman slams surging net migration as a ‘slap in the face’ for UK voters
FORMER Home Secretary Suella Braverman has called net migration climbing to 745,000 a “slap in the face” for British voters
It came after statisticians revised their previous total for last year, saying they had missed 139,000 migrants owing to their “unexpected” behaviour.
Ms Braverman last night led a huge backlash from the Tory right and claimed she had unsuccessfully pushed for harsher curbs while in Cabinet.
She said: “Today’s record migration stats show we’ve let in an extra million people in just two years, a population equivalent to Birmingham.
“The pressure on housing, the NHS, schools, wages, and community cohesion, is unsustainable. When do we say enough is enough?
“We were elected on a pledge to reduce net migration. Today’s record numbers are a slap in the face to the British public who have voted to control and reduce migration.”
PM Rishi Sunak, who sacked Ms Braverman, has been warned by right wingers that slashing migration is a “do or die” issue — after his previous pledge to reduce it to 2019 levels of 230,000.
No10 yesterday admitted figures were “far too high”.
The Sun believes Downing Street is urgently drawing up a response package, expected to include a crackdown on workers bringing their dependants.
The only glimmer of good news for the PM is that the Office for National Statistics put net migration for the year to June 2023 at a slightly lower 672,000.
A total of 1.18million came to the UK during that period — most of them legally — and 508,000 left.
It came after two migrants died attempting to cross the Channel by boat from France on Wednesday.
The New Conservatives faction of Tory MPs said: “Each of us made a promise to the electorate. We don’t believe promises can be ignored.”
Ex-Cabinet Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg said: “I’m embarrassed we haven’t achieved what we set out to.”