How Tony Blair and New Labour Opened the Floodgates for Immigration
In 1997, New Labour were elected in a landslide election. Led by Tony Blair, this was the largest landslide victory for any political party in the UK since 1945, after 18-years of Conservative leadership.
The Conservatives permanently lost their reputation for fiscal competence on "Black Wednesday", when Britain was forced to humiliatingly withdraw from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.
The Tory party was deeply and publicly fractured over European integration, specifically the Maastricht Treaty, making John Major's government appear weak and ungovernable.
A relentless stream of financial and personal sex scandals involving Tory MPs dominated the press, establishing a narrative of a corrupt, decaying, and arrogant administration. A sentiment of a much-needed change prevailed in the elections, and New Labour took office on May 2, 1997.
The Cabinet Blair was Prime Minister; a younger politician who was the face of an evolved-Labour party. John Prescott was to be Deputy PM, Gordon Brown as Chancellor, Robin Cook as Foreign Secretary, and Jack Straw as Home Secretary.
On immigration, New Labour had one of the most open and expansive policies in Europe. New Labour's policies lifted restrictions for work-permits, criteria was relaxed, the number of international students was doubled.
In 2004, Labour made the decision to allow the citizens of 8 European countries that were about to join the EU the immediate right to work in the UK. This resulted in one of the largest inflows of migrants in European history.
Notably, in 1999, when Minister of State for Asylum and Immigration Barbara Roche was entering her tenure, immigration sharply rose under her leadership.
Roche was a prominent advocate for the economic benefits of migration. In a landmark speech in 2000 at the Institute for Public Policy Research, she pushed to relax certain controls, outlining a strategy that publicly embraced economic migration.
In 1997, net migration was 48,000. By the time Roche stepped away from the immigration portfolio in 2001, net figures had climbed past 160,000 and the metric never fell below 100,000 again.