Tony Blair opened UK borders to east European migrants despite misgivings
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Tony Blair's Labour government pushed on with plans to open the UK's borders to Eastern Europe despite mounting concerns from senior ministers, according to newly released official files. The former prime minister relaxed immigration controls in 2004 after eight mainly former Soviet states, including Poland, Lithuania and Hungary, joined the EU.
Papers given to the National Archives in London show then deputy PM John Prescott and foreign secretary Jack Straw both urged delay to the policy, warning of a surge in immigration unless some restrictions were put in place. But others - including then home secretary David Blunkett - argued that the economy needed the "flexibility and productivity of migrant labour" if it was to continue to prosper.
The records emerged as part of a yearly release of Cabinet Office files once they are 20 years old. The papers also show:. Calls for open borders re-think. Labour's Emily Thornberry and mayor of London Sadiq Khan honoured in New Year list. Labour would lose almost 200 seats in 'highly unstable' parliament if election held today, poll suggests.
Stand-out names of those receiving New Year Honours including Olympic athletes, actors and community heroes. The Blair government's open borders policy is seen as having helped fuel anti-EU sentiment by the time of the Brexit referendum in 2016. There was a major increase in immigration in the years that followed, with net migration rising to more than 200,000 a year and cheaper foreign labour blamed for undercutting local workers.
