A new European Union study has found that there are 600,000 unemployed immigrants from EU countries living in the UK.
The study, which was obtained by The Sunday Telegraph, found that the number of ‘non-active’ EU migrants in Britain has risen by 42 per cent between 2006 and 2012, meaning that 611,779 ‘non-active’ EU migrants were living in Britain last year, up from 431,687 just six years ago.
Eurosceptic MPs have already reacted to this report by stating that the finding only highlight the need for the UK to crackdown on EU immigration – something the government is already moving towards by tightening the benefits and healthcare access that all new immigrants will be entitled to.
“These figures show that the wave of benefit migrants has become a tsunami of economic refugees fleeing the eurozone crisis to try to find jobs here,” Conservative MP Douglas Carswell told the Sunday Telegraph.
“We cannot both continue the free-at-the-point-of-use welfare state and benefits system and allow Europeans to flee the eurozone and come here.
“It is decision time. I would rather we quit Europe and had our own system of social protection,” he added.
The report also found that the current annual cost to the NHS of ‘non-active’ EU migrants is estimated to be at £1.5 billion. In contrast, the estimated cost to France’s health system of “non-active” EU migrants is a fraction of that to the NHS, at just £3.4 million.
Article published 14th October 2013