About 10% of Britain's highly skilled Workforce has emigrated out of Britain - a trend that shows no signs of slowing. The top three countries where Brits are choosing to start their new lives are Australia, United States and Canada.
Enthused by the Work possibilities, higher living standards and better wages, Britain's brain-drain has seen a rapid increase, as the British workforce looks for better life prospects and living conditions. The reports estimate that the UK is losing on average 300,000 Britons every year, 10% of whom are a highly skilled workforce.
According to the report by University College London, although the Britons are leaving, they are being replaced by the rapid immigration into the United Kingdom, which is at its highest since 2005. The official data indicates that almost 300,000 immigrants have moved to the UK, making a 40% increase from 12 months ago. Despite David Cameron's promise to lessen the immigration by 'tens of thousands', the figures now show that such is not the case. In addition, UCL argues that the immigrants who are replacing the emigrating British population have contributed mostly to the unskilled sectors, stagnating the highly skilled job sectors, contributing to further 'brain-drain' in United Kingdom.
The report goes on to say that out of the 9.6 million working-age adults, immigrants make up 25% of that number, who have low numerical literacy skills.
However, the large immigrant influx to the UK indicates a healthy economy, perhaps more so than many of its European counterparts. The British Office of National Statistics states that the number of EU citizens moving to the United Kingdom increased from 43,000 to 251,000 for the period.
The Chairman of MigrationWatch added that, although highly skilled workers are leaving Britain, they tend to return later on.
The problem might not be so much the highly skilled workforce leaving as much as the low skilled workforce entering at a much higher pace.
One of the immigration rules implemented to curb immigrant unemployment came in a form of a requirement to speak English as a prerequisite to coming to stay in the United Kingdom, a rule which encompasses couples and spouses. The Supreme Court, however, challenged this ruling, calling it discriminatory and unreasonable, and questioned its status under the European Convention on Human Rights.