A few years ago Britain’s door was wide open to(对……完全开放) immigrants. It was possible to hire foreign workers “from the other side of the world” and pay them just £26,000 ($35,000) a year, marvels(惊叹，感到惊奇) Dawood Ibtehsam, who owns a McDonald’s restaurant franchise in Warwick, a county town in the West Midlands.
几年前，英国的大门对移民敞开。沃里克（西米德兰兹郡的一个县城）一家麦当劳餐厅的特许经营者达伍德·伊布特萨姆惊叹道，当时可以雇佣“来自世界另一端”的外籍工人，年薪仅需2.6万英镑（约3.5万美元）。
Huge numbers of people arrived in the country between 2021 and 2024, an unprecedented(史无前例的) surge that Reform UK, a right-wing populist party, calls “the Boriswave” (see chart 1). At the peak, the year to March 2023, almost 1.5m immigrants came. The Office for National Statistics thinks that far fewer people left, so net migration amounted to 944,000. Many of the migrants were workers drawn by a newly liberalised(自由化的，放宽限制的) visa regime. Others were students, who had recently been permitted to work after graduating. Still others were Hong Kongers and Ukrainians(① 背景：2020年香港《国安法》后，英...) fleeing oppression and invasion.
2021年至2024年间，大量人口涌入英国，这是一次史无前例的激增，右翼民粹政党英国改革党称之为“鲍里斯潮”（见图表1）。在截至2023年3月的年度高峰期，近150万移民抵达。英国国家统计局认为离境人数远少于到达人数，因此净移民达到94.4万。许多移民是被新近自由化的签证制度吸引的工人。另一些是最近获准毕业后可以工作的学生。还有一些是逃离压迫和入侵的香港人和乌克兰人。
How much has changed. Net migration to Britain last year amounted to 171,000—the lowest level since 2012, if the pandemic years are excluded.(去年英国净移民为17.1万——若不计疫情年份，是2012年以来的最低水平。) The human haul(人员总量，移民总数) will probably be even lower this year, largely because the number of economic migrants(经济移民) continues to fall fast. Between January and March just 5,900 people applied for skilled-worker visas, down from 19,100 two years ago. Applications for student visas are also declining. James Bowes of Warwick University thinks net migration might even turn negative in 2026.
变化何其大。去年英国净移民为17.1万——若不计疫情年份，是2012年以来的最低水平。今年的移民总量很可能更低，主要是因为经济移民数量持续快速下降。今年1月至3月，仅有5900人申请技术工人签证，而两年前为1.91万人。学生签证申请也在下降。华威大学的詹姆斯·鲍斯认为，2026年净移民甚至可能转为负值。
Out of control
失控
Not just a numbers game
不只是数字游戏
