Geoffrey Clifton-Brown
Main Page: Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Conservative - North Cotswolds)Department Debates - View all Geoffrey Clifton-Brown's debates with the Home Office
(9 months ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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We are working intensively across Government to fine-tune our plan, and I hope we will be in a position to set it out very soon. I know that the hon. Gentleman shares my determination to tackle this issue. It is critical for his constituents and mine that we bring down net migration and make use of the levers that we now have at our disposal, and that we do not betray those who voted for Brexit and wanted to give us those levers so that we could use them.
These figures were, I regret to say, entirely predictable, and they are unsustainable: they put too much pressure on our public services. My constituents want to know—and we have been talking about this for years—when they will see a drop in the numbers.
According to the Office for National Statistics, the figures are starting to fall—although the ONS’s methodology itself keeps moving around, so one has to treat that with a degree of scepticism. It is now critical, to my mind, that we introduce a set of fundamental reforms. The time for tinkering is over, and I hope that the package that the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary and I will put together in the coming weeks will meet the expectations of my hon. Friend.