Keir Starmer has been urged to tackle a “dangerous brain drain” harming the UK economy just days before next week’s make-or-break Budget after official figures showed the number of Britons leaving the UK is far higher than previously thought.
A total of 257,000 British nationals are now thought to have left the country last year – 180,000 more than the initial estimate of just 77,000, according to the statistics, which also revealed net migration reached a new record high.
In the three years between the end of 2021 and the end of 2024, a total of 344,000 more Brits emigrated than previously thought, after the Office for National Statistics (ONS) updated its methodology.
The extent of people leaving the UK comes as a blow to Sir Keir just a week before his government’s crucial Budget, amid claims Downing Street is panicking to save his premiership.
Karl Williams, research director at the Centre for Policy Studies think tank, told The Independent the figures pointed to “an alarming brain drain, with net emigration of British nationals both much higher than previously thought – and accelerating”.
“This new data supports the mountain of anecdotal evidence about young people increasingly moving abroad to places like Dubai and Australia for better wages, lower taxes and cheaper housing,” he added. “Britain urgently needs to stop penalising wealth creators, start bulding houses and take action to bear down on the cost of living, otherwise the loss of some of our most productive workers – and highest taxpayers – will only continue.”
The shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride said: “Britain is now confronting a dangerous brain drain. Many of our brightest young people, teachers, doctors and innovators are looking abroad – and many wealth creators have already left.”
The Conservative frontbencher said they were being driven out by “Labour’s punishing taxes and policies that suffocate ambition. These are the people who power growth and fund our public services, and once they go, they take opportunity with them.Labour must reverse course now, before the talent Britain relies on is lost for good.”
Meanwhile, the British Medical Association told The Independent it was “very concerned” about the UK’s ability to keep doctors in the country. It pointed to a General Medical Council report which suggested that more than 4,000 doctors left the UK to practise abroad last year.
The figures follow claims that as many as 16,500 millionaires would leave the UK this year in response to tax changes and a lack of confidence in the faltering economy. The Henley Private Wealth Migration Report forecast that the UK would lose twice as many as China, and 10 times as many as Russia.
A poll carried out for the British Council last year found nearly three-quarters (72 per cent) of UK based 18–30-year-olds would consider living and working in another country in the short or long term, moving mainly for better job opportunities and quality of life. The most popular destinations were Australia, the USA, Canada and Italy.
Estimates were previously based on the ‘International Passenger Survey’, but this had a very small sample size and had been “stretched beyond its original purpose” so was no longer reliable, the ONS said.
The estimates are now produced using more comprehensive data from the Department for Work and Pensions, which looks at everyone with a National Insurance number and can be used to determine their likely migration status.
The ONS also announced that net migration was 944,000 in the year ending March 2023, 38,000 more than estimated, as it reached a higher peak that previously thought and then fell faster in 2024 following the tightening of visa rules. Net migration is the difference between the number of people moving long-term to the UK and the number leaving.
The new statistics come as the Labour home secretary Shabana Mahmood came under fire for unveiling a raft of controversial hardline measures on Monday designed to discourage asylum seekers and make it easier to remove those who have no right to remain in the country.
But there was good news for Ms Mahmood, as the figures also showed that, more recently, net migration – the number coming to the UK minus those who leave – fell further than previously thought. In the year ending December 2024, the figure was 345,000, lower than the previous estimate of 431,000.
Earlier, a Labour peer accused Ms Mahmoodof using “children as a weapon” in her asylum system proposals.
Lord Alf Dubs, asked about arguments that asylum seekers are using their children to ‘thwart removal’, told the BBC’s Today programme: “I think that’s a theoretical statement – I just don’t accept that.”
He added: “To use children as a weapon, as the home secretary is doing, I think is a shabby thing – I’m lost for words, frankly, because my concern was that if we remove people who come here, what happens if they’ve had children in the meantime? What are we supposed to do with children who are born here, who’ve been to school here, who are part of our community, our society? We can’t just say, ‘oh well, out you go because your parents don’t claim to be here’.”
