Just one in five new UK jobs went to Britons over the past decade, report finds the vast majority taken by migrants from outside the EU

One in five. That is the share of new jobs created in the United Kingdom over the past decade that went to Britons, according to a new report cited by the Daily Mail. The vast majority of the rest were taken by migrants from outside the EU — workers admitted under the visa system that replaced freedom of movement after Brexit.

The number compresses a decade of political argument into a single line. The migration debate before the referendum was about EU freedom of movement; what came after was a points-based system built around the employer. Companies hold the sponsorship licences, decide which vacancies to fill from abroad and vouch for the candidates, while the Home Office processes the paperwork. The report suggests the arrangement performed exactly as constructed: four in five of the decade's new jobs went to workers from abroad, most of them from outside the EU, arriving on visas their employers had requested.

The economics are uncomplicated. An employer who fills a post keeps the output; the housing, school places and GP appointments a larger population requires are paid out of general taxation. The demand for labour is private, the delivery system is public. What the referendum redistributed was not the volume of migration but its management — from a treaty regime in Brussels to the HR departments that file the sponsorships.

Ministers have defended the points-based system as the deliverable of Brexit: a border under national control, admitting exactly the workers the economy needs. The report is consistent with that description. The economy did get the workers it asked for. What the ballot paper never specified was who would do the asking, and who would be sent the bill for the population that came with them.

The decade the report covers runs from the referendum campaign to the points-based system now in place. The report's count of what the decade delivered fits in one line: one new job in five for Britons, and four in five filled through a system in which the employer — not the electorate — certifies the need.