Home Secretary urged to create illegal immigrant amnesty

Half a million illegal immigrants should be given the right to stay in Britain under an amnesty that would bring in up to £1 billion in extra tax revenue, a leading think-tank said today.

The Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR), which is influential with New Labour, urged Jacqui Smith to make the radical step one of her first acts as Home Secretary.

It said that the costs of forcibly deporting those who live and work illegally in the UK would be £4.7 billion and, according to Home Office estimates, could take more than 30 years.

Doing so is "simply not desirable or feasible", the think-tank said, while regularising them could earn the Treasury £1 billion in additional taxes.

Its call comes after Commons Leader Harriet Harman and Health Secretary Alan Johnson appeared to back the idea during Labour's deputy leadership campaign.

The IPPR's head of migration and equalities, Danny Sriskandarajah, said: "Illegal immigration is a deeply difficult subject for politicians to tackle."

"But Jacqui Smith should listen to her Cabinet colleagues and back a plan for regularising the nearly half million people who live and work illegally in the UK."

"The simple truth is that we are not going to deport hundreds of thousands of people from the UK."

"Our economy would shrink and we would notice it straightaway in uncleaned offices, dirty streets and unstaffed pubs and clubs."

"So we have a choice: make people live in the shadows, exploited and fearful for the future; or bring them into the mainstream, to pay taxes and live an honest life."

Immigration Minister Liam Byrne has repeatedly rejected calls for an amnesty, most recently in the Commons last Monday.

A Home Office spokesman said: "Immigration policy needs to be managed fairly and effectively."

"This is what the public wants and that is what is being delivered."

"An amnesty for immigrants illegally in the UK is unnecessary and would simply create a strong pull for waves of illegal" migration."

The spokesman added that a new Australian-style points system for managed migration would allow the UK to admit skilled migrants to fill gaps in the economy.

Shadow home secretary David Davis said: "Even talking about such an amnesty does harm, let alone actually granting one."

"It is worrying that senior members of this Government, including Harriet Harman, have backed such a move."

"Other countries who have granted an amnesty have found it creates an unstoppable stream of illegal immigration."

"The state of our porous borders means that granting an amnesty for around 500,000 would quickly lead to thousands more taking their place."

"The only long term solution is to have an efficient asylum system so that we don't develop the huge back log from which this Government now suffers."

Copyright - Press Association 2007

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