A record 164,635 people were granted British citizenship last year, government figures have shown.
Graph of people granted British citizenship
The number of asylum applications is rising after an record low was reported last year, but the 2008 figure is still the second lowest since 1993/94.
In 2007/088 most of those seeking asylum were from Afghanistan, Iraq, Zimbabwe or China.
The number of failed asylum seekers deported from January to March was down 13%, to 2,805.
The total number of people removed - including foreign criminals - was up 12% to 16,760.
Figures showed 845,000 people whose countries joined the EU in 2004 applied between May that year and the end of March 2008 to work in Britain. Of those, more than half a million were from Poland.
The nations that joined the EU in May 2004 are Poland, Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Hungary, Slovakia and Slovenia.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7410046.stm
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1 comment:
And all these people are free to come to Ireland and avail of all the rights that a UK citizen has here, work, social welfare, voting etc.
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