The Express cites the Office of National Statistics for data behind their claims, specifically the estimate of long term migrants. Short-term migrants are classed as staying for less than a year, and long term is anything more than this. To arrive at the statistic shown in the headline, the Express has added five years’ worth of data of short-term EU visitors to the official estimate of long term migrants. However, short time migrants only reside in Britain for a year or less, meaning it is not accurate to include them in the statistic. Furthermore, the phrase ‘found down the back of the sofa’ is also inaccurate as the short term migrant statistics were published by ONS meaning that they were available to the public.
The article then also goes on to claim “Piotr the plumber” might “have had no intention of staying on” beyond a year, he might change his mind and stay. In the report by ONS, the statistic of long-term migration is adjusted to account for ‘switchers’, people who start out as visitors but stay for longer. The paper itself has its maths wrong as the ONS estimates long-term migration in the five years to June 2015 was 1 million, not 900,000.
Furthermore, the newspaper makes other claims from these inaccurate statistics such as migrants are responsible for children not getting into secondary school, people not getting on the housing ladder and pregnant woman being turned away from maternity units.