Undocumented Migrants
(asked on 7th January 2020) - View Source
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the numbers of illegal immigrants living in (1) England, (2) Northern Ireland, (3) Scotland, and (4) Wales.
Answered by
Baroness Williams of Trafford
Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
By its very nature, it is not possible to know the exact size of the illegal population and so we do not seek to make any official estimates.
The Government is focused on making it harder for people to enter and live in the UK illegally, whilst ensuring those who have the right to reside in the UK can do so. Exit checks introduced in April 2015 will, over time provide more detailed insights into the behaviour of migrants and how they comply with the restrictions placed upon their length of stay in the UK, but the data obtained does not provide the total number of illegal migrants currently in the UK. In June 2019, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) published a note on measuring illegal migration.