AUSTRALIAN IMMIGRATION NEWS

Record Number of Emigrants from UK

Friday, 24 August 2007

According to the Office of National Statistics, a record number of people are emigrating from the United Kingdom for greener, and sunnier, pastures abroad.

By far, Australia was the top emigration destination for UK citizens, 71,000 UK citizens now calling Australia home. The next closest country of destination was Spain, accounting for 58,000 emigrants from the United Kingdom.

Emigrants for the UK stated concerns about overcrowding, declining infrastructure quality and a rising cost of living as main reasons why they wished to leave the UK.

Australia is considered the destination of choice because of its sunny climate, cosmopolitan, well organised cities and plentiful job opportunities, especially for UK education professionals and tradespeople.

In addition, the impending changes to Australia’s General Skilled Migration system on are expected to be extremely favourable to workers from the UK. Workers from the UK will have an advantage because of their English skills, which will score an additional 5 points when the new changes take effect on September 1.