Brexit: what they voted for and what they got

Brexit: the immigration they promised to control has soared

When the British voted to leave the EU, one of the flagship promises was taking back control of the borders. There was talk of an Australian-style points system that would filter entry by qualification and salary, and of easing pressure on housing and wages. Seven years later, the result is, at the very least, paradoxical.

The mirage of immigration control

The available data indicate that net migration in the UK has not only failed to fall, but has reached record levels. What has changed is where people come from: where European citizens —Poles, Romanians, Bulgarians— used to arrive, people now come from outside Europe: Nigeria, Pakistan, India. The migration profile has changed, but the overall volume has not dropped. Some analyses suggest that the points system, far from being a selective barrier, has served to channel flows from non-EU countries.

The perception of losing control over who comes in and who does not has led to a curious corollary: those who once called for the Polish plumber to be sent packing now face a different migration reality, but one just as hard to manage. As a well-known saying aptly applied to this case puts it: "We didn't need to pack so much luggage for this alucinación."

Political volatility as a consequence

Responsibility for migration policy now rests entirely with the UK government, with no Brussels to blame. Over the past decade, the UK has seen five or six prime ministers come and go, a turnover that reflects the parties' inability to manage broken promises. Some argue that Brexit was a blank cheque to politicians, and that they have proven unequal to the task. Others, more sceptical, believe the problem was never the EU, but the utopian belief that a vote could solve structural problems.

The question that remains open

If there were another vote today, would Leave win again? Some say yes, that the desire for sovereignty remains intact despite the results. Others point out that frustration with what came after could have tipped the scales. What is clear is that the gap between what was promised and what has been delivered is so vast that it is hard to find anyone who defends the outcome as an unqualified success. How long will the narrative hold?