Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government why they have included international students in their net migration figures.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon. Member's Parliamentary Question of 29 November is attached.

Professor Sir Ian Diamond | National Statistician

The Lord Leong CBE

House of Lords

London

SW1A0PW

08 December 2022

Dear Lord Leong,

As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking why international students have been included in our net migration figures (HL3844).

Statistics on long-term international migration produced by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) are estimated in accordance with international standards. The United Nations definition of a long-term migrant is: “A person who moves to a country other than that of his or her usual residence for a period of at least a year (12 months), so that the country of destination effectively becomes his or her new country of usual residence[1] .” International students will typically live in the UK for more than a year, and so meet the definition of a long-term migrant.

However, we recognise this definition is narrow and doesn’t always meet user needs. We have plans to explore alternative definitions, including estimating net migration by reason, such as study[2] . This will help provide more context to headline measures of migration, addressing recent findings from the ONS research that most international students will leave the UK after their studies are concluded.

Yours sincerely,

Professor Sir Ian Diamond

[1] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/internationalmigration/ methodologies/longterminternationalmigrationestimatesmethodology#:~:text=Definition%20of%20a%20l ongterm%20migrant&text=%E2%80%9CA%20person%20who%20moves%20to,new%20country%20of%20 usual%20residence.%E2%80%9D

[2] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/populationandmigration/internationalmigration/ articles/internationalmigrationstatisticaldesignprogressreport/july2022#how-we-are-transformingmigration-statistics