Multiculturalism

How Labour threw open doors to mass migration in secret plot to make a multicultural UK

By James Slack
Last updated at 10:19 AM on 10th February 2010

Labour threw open the doors to mass migration in a deliberate policy to change the social make-up of the UK, secret papers suggest.

A draft report from the Cabinet Office shows that ministers wanted to ‘maximise the contribution’ of migrants to their ‘social objectives’.

The number of foreigners allowed in the UK increased by as much as 50 per cent in the wake of the report, written in 2000.

Labour has always justified immigration on economic grounds and denied it was using it to foster multiculturalism.

But suspicions of a secret agenda rose when Andrew Neather, a former government adviser and speech writer for Tony Blair, Jack Straw and David Blunkett, said the aim of Labour’s immigration strategy was to ‘rub the Right’s nose in diversity and render their arguments out of date’.

Mr Neather said he helped to write the 2000 report which outlined a strategy to ‘open up the UK to mass migration’.

The document was not published in its original format over fears of an adverse public reaction. Instead it was released a year later as a research document on the economic benefits of migration.

Mr Neather’s claims last October were denied by ministers, including Justice Secretary Jack Straw, who said they were nonsense.

A draft of the original Cabinet Office report has now been published following a freedom of information request by Migrationwatch.

It contains six references to social policy, all of which were removed from the later, published version.

One deleted paragraph said a framework was needed to ‘maximise the contribution of migration to the Government’s social and economic objectives’.

Another says that migration pressures will intensify because of demographic changes across Europe but that this ‘should not be viewed as a negative’.

It states: ‘The entry control system is not closely related to the stated policy objectives.

'This is particularly true in the social area, where in the past the implicit assumption has largely been that keeping people out promotes stability.’

Also cut out was a statement that ‘in practice, entry controls can contribute to social exclusion’.

Damian Green, Tory immigration spokesman, said: ‘This is a very significant finding because it would mean that Labour’s biggest long term effect on British society was
based on a completely secret policy.

‘This shows Labour’s open-door immigration policy was deliberate and ministers should apologise.’

Mr Neather’s claims were made in a column for the London Evening Standard. He said Labour’s relaxation of immigration controls was a deliberate attempt to engineer a ‘truly multicultural’ country and plug gaps in the jobs market.

He remembered ‘coming away from some discussions with the clear sense that the policy was intended – even if this wasn’t its main purpose – to rub the Right’s nose in diversity’.

Whitehall research shows that the number of foreigners arriving in the UK rose from 370,000 in 2001 to 510,000 in 2006.

The figures for net foreign immigration– the number of non-British citizens arriving, less the number leaving – are even more dramatic.

In 2001, this figure stood at 221,000 but by 2007 it had risen as high as 333,000 – up 50 per cent.

The number fell to 250,000 in 2008 mainly because of a decline in arrivals from Eastern Europe.

It had already emerged that the Cabinet Office report was censored to remove details of possible links between immigration and organised crime, street fights and begging.

One of the sections missing from the final report said: ‘There is emerging evidence that the circumstances in which asylum seekers are living is leading to criminal offences, including fights and begging.’

A second section warned: ‘Migration has opened up new opportunities for organised crime.’

Last night, immigration minister Phil Woolas said there was ‘no open door policy on migration’.

He said the draft report made clear that migration was ‘not a substitute for Government policies on skills, education and training of British citizens – which the Government has invested in over the past decade’.