Why numeric migration caps fail

Good morning. Should the government have a numeric cap on immigration? Kemi Badenoch has committed to going into the next election with a specific numeric limit on migrants (exact number to be decided at a future date), while Labour Together, the Starmerite think-tank, has proposed that the government should set a ranged target. Some thoughts on both those proposals in today’s note.

Policymaking possibilities

One reason why strict numeric caps on immigration are a bad idea is that the number of people who enter or leave a country in any given year is the product of decisions taken over a very long time. For instance, the high numbers seen in the last few years of the Conservative government had any number of causes, in no particular order:

1. The decision taken by governments around the world to lockdown as a result of the novel coronavirus in 2020.

2. Decisions taken regarding Hong Kong, starting, depending on your perspective, in 1898, 1997 and 2020 in the UK, or in 1997, 2012, 2019 and 2020 in China.

3. Decisions over the funding of British universities and the overseas fees regime made from 1987 onwards.

4. Decisions about the funding regime for nursing bursaries, the compensation for British clinicians.

5. Decisions relating to the UK’s overall economic model in 1981, 1997, 2004, 2008, etc etc.

6. Decisions about relative levels of tax and spending over decades.

7. Changes to the UK’s immigration system brought in by the Conservatives after Brexit

In a “normal” year, the level of immigration that a country might want, need or expect to have is set in part by what happened to be on the school curriculum 10 or 20 years ago. Having a strict numeric cap is like proposing a limit on how much money the government might spend in, say, 2042. You are essentially guaranteeing that you will make a promise with little control over whether you keep it.

And so pledges on immigration proved a struggle for the Conservatives from 2010. They kept making promises that required doing things that would have been incredibly unpopular. So they kept breaking those promises, so they became less and less trusted on them.

Kemi Badenoch shouldn’t commit to a strict numeric cap because previous pledges to do so were a disaster for the Tory party and, more importantly, for trust in British politics. There is no compelling reason to believe that it will become any easier for future governments to fulfil their promises on immigration.

What about Labour Together’s idea of setting a range, instead of numerical targets? It’s more deliverable to say that, for instance, we would hope that in a “normal” year, net immigration to the UK will be lower than it was in 2022 and 2023. We would hope that in a normal year, fewer than 160,000 people will need to come to the UK via a humanitarian route (the number in 2022), because we should hope that in a normal year, there will not be a war in Europe or a brutal crackdown on human rights elsewhere. And we would hope, too, that we will not have to go through another lockdown and the resulting spike in unmet demand afterwards.

It also places immigration numbers on a scale where the government of the day actually does shape them a bit (albeit only at the margin unless you want to switch to some kind of planned economy). My political concern here is that in the end you get a number that still sounds quite large to the public, just as any credible “numeric cap” would be. But it would, at least, be a device that might make for a better quality of policymaking when it comes to immigration.

Now try this

My films of 2024, in no particular order: The Boy and the Heron, Anyone But You, The Holdovers, American Fiction, Challengers, Thelma, His Three Daughters, Blink Twice, My Old Ass and Megalopolis. I think my favourite stupid film of the year was Blink Twice, my favourite comedy was Anyone But You, and my favourite smart film of the year was His Three Daughters.

Top stories today

• Shifting gears | A new scheme this year was supposed to boost electric vehicle sales, but consumers remain reluctant to buy the cars in sufficient numbers. Jonathan Reynolds, business secretary, is set to water down the existing rules with a rapid consultation to be announced next week.

• Czech in | The sale of Royal Mail to Czech billionaire Daniel Křetínský has been approved by the UK government, paving the way for the formerly state-owned postal service provider to pass into foreign ownership. EP UK Bidco, Křetínský’s vehicle, said it had promised there would be no change in control at Royal Mail for three years following the deal, and that it would safeguard “the important role that Royal Mail plays in the UK”.

• Spring loaded | Rachel Reeves will not hold an emergency tax-raising Budget next spring in the event low growth or other setbacks blow a hole in her fiscal plans, the Treasury has insisted, pointing to a spending squeeze if action was needed. Treasury officials pointed to Reeves’ comments this month to the Daily Mail in which she left open the possibility of further tax rises next autumn.

• New kid in the bloc | Britain became the first European nation to join an Indo-Pacific trade bloc yesterday, although the estimated £2bn “long-run” benefits to the UK economy will be dwarfed by Brexit-related loss of trade with the EU.

• Demands to name alleged spy | MPs fear the government is moving too fast to re-establish UK-China relations as some consider naming the alleged spy who used his relationship with Prince Andrew to get access to the heart of the British establishment, reports the Guardian. There is a court anonymity order protecting the identity of the alleged spy, though that may be lifted.