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UK illegals 'a major concern'
18/05/2006 15:23 - (SA)
Robert MacPherson
London - The aura of haplessness hanging over Prime Minister Tony Blair's government grew on Wednesday, when he admitted it has no idea exactly how many illegal immigrants are in Britain.
Blair told parliament: "There are no official estimates of the number of illegal immigrants into the United Kingdom."
"By its very nature illegal immigration is difficult to measure and any estimates would be highly speculative."
Immigration minister Tony McNulty told BBC television later that the best estimate of the number of illegal immigrants was between 310 000 and 570 000, and it could take 10 years to deport them.
On parliament, Blair used the issue to promote his controversial plan to introduce ID cards for everyone in the country.
Blair said: "We need identity cards for foreign nationals and for British nationals.
"If we want to track people coming in and out of our country and know the identity of people here, that is what we have to do."
Blair left on defensive
But with his popularity at its lowest point since he came to power nine years ago and his Labour government ensnared in several furores, Blair was left on the defensive.
In a testy exchange across the floor of the lower House of Commons, Conservative leader David Cameron said the prime minister sounded "rattled" and that the government was in "paralysis".
The immigration flap grew out of an admission by Dave Roberts, the Home Office official in charge of deportations, on Tuesday.
He told a parliamentary committee he did not have "the faintest idea" how many illegal immigrants were in the country.
Political analysts were not too surprised, given that visitors to Britain go through immigration controls only when they arrive, and there has never been a peacetime ID card system - as in continental Europe.
Notion that government is not in control
Technically speaking, an illegal immigrant could easily be a well-heeled young American student who overstays his or her visa.
But for many Britons, the phrase brings to mind failed asylum-seekers from the Middle East and Africa who ignore their deportation order, disappear into their ethnic communities and try to earn a living on the black market.
It is an issue many Britons consider a major concern.
Blair's admission on Wednesday only fed the notion that Blair's government is gradually losing its authority.
Cameron, whose Conservatives now lead Labour in opinion polls, said: "Whether it is deporting dangerous criminals, sorting out the mess of the Human Rights Act or dealing with illegal immigration, this is a government in paralysis."
Blair has been facing uproars over the British Home Office's failure to consider more than 1 000 foreign convicts for deportation after they had served their prison terms.
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