Will restrictions on immigration pay off?

In a speech this week at the Royal College of Midwives' conference, general secretary Cathy Warwick said the coalition had 'gone back on pre-election pledges to increase the number of midwives.'

I know it's difficult to believe that anyone associated with The Coalition has gone back on election promises but apparently David Cameron stated "We are going to make our midwives' lives a lot easier. They are crucial to making a mum's experience of birth as good as it can possibly be, but today they are overworked and demoralised. So we will increase the number of midwives by 3,000." The pledge has now been filed away with Nick Clegg's promise to abolish tuition fees, leaving the midwife service close to 'cracking point' as the number of live births in England rose by 107,314 (19 per cent) between 2001 and 2009 to more than 670,000 a year.

Also this week it was reported that white Britons will be in a minority in the UK by 2066. In an article in Prospect Magazine, Oxford University Professor David Coleman states that the white British population of the country will be 'majority minority' during the lifetimes of most young adults and that this will 'change national identity.' He recommends a fairly modest decrease in immigration from outside the EU of 25%. If no change is made and immigration remains at approximately 180,000 a year, the white British-born population would decline from 80 per cent of the total now to 59 per cent in 2051.

In 1998 there were 86,456 babies born in England and Wales to mothers born abroad. Last year, the total had reached 174,400, according to ONS. The rising proportion of children of migrant mothers is a result both of high levels of immigration and higher birth rates among newly-arrived families which must be increasing pressure on midwives.

The question is should The Coalition a) increase the number of midwives, or b) cap immigration? Well, we know they reneged on a, and this week we heard more about their plan b, which requires non-EU immigration to be limited to 24,100 per year. Some senior government figures are against the cap; the Business Secretary Vince Cable recently stated that restrictions on immigration were doing 'huge damage' to business. Mr Cable believes limiting the amount of foreign (non-EU) talent that businesses can import has led companies to relocate overseas where there is greater access to skilled professionals. Some blue elements of The Coalition agree: Boris Johnson, has also raised concerns about the cap.

He told the BBC that the capital's economy depended on "talent being able to migrate in" and said accountancy firms, banks and law firms "actually find it very, very difficult at the moment to get in some of the people who you really need to keep London's economy going". BBC Business Editor Robert Peston concurs, stating that "The pool of highly skilled people just isn't wide enough or deep enough in the UK. The low cap may also mean that the number of high paying overseas students may have to be reduced by 60% just at the moment universities are facing a funding crisis."

Aside from skills vital to do business and much needed capital injections, what have immigrants ever done for us? Well, other than improved cuisine, higher standards of odd-job-man-ship and a willingness to undertake unpleasant jobs, at the other end of the spectrum to those mentioned by Cable and Johnson, they may yet fund the eventual retirement of the ageing 'indigenous' population of this country. More babies, safely delivered by midwives, growing up in a country where adequate amounts of foreign experts are welcomed in will help to build a more robust, competitive economy than battening down the hatches.