David Cameron: It would be 'madness' to leave the EU just to bring down migration

EU debate: David Cameron was grilled by a live TV audience
Sky News
Hannah Al-Othman2 June 2016

David Cameron has insisted that Britain can achieve balanced migration with the European Union - despite the fact that he has failed to meet his "ambition" of bring net migration below 100,000.

Facing the cameras for his first setpiece TV event of the EU referendum campaign, the Prime Minister acknowledged that around 600,000 more EU nationals had come to live and work in the UK since the start of his premiership than Britons moving to the continent.

But he said it would be "madness" to try to bring the net migration figure down by quitting the EU, which he said would "trash" the UK economy.

Instead, he said he expected immigration and emigration rates with the rest of the EU to come into balance as the economies of members like Ireland, France and Germany catch up with the "extraordinary" job-creation record of the UK - though he declined to put a timetable on the development.

Speaking on Sky News's Europe In or Out broadcast, Mr Cameron said he stuck by his "aspiration" of bringing net migration into the UK - which last month hit 333,000 - below 100,000.

The Prime Minister said when he promised to reduce net migration to tens of thousands things were different, maintaining it was not a pledge but an aspiration.

As he was grilled by a live TV audience, Mr Cameron blamed the growth of the UK economy for attracting people from Europe.

But he insisted: "It would be madness to try to do that by trashing our economy and pulling out of the single market."

Mr Cameron said that since he came to power in 2010, around 600,000 Britons had gone to live and work in other EU countries while 1.2 million EU citizens had come to the UK.

But he said: "The way to meet that challenge mustn't be to leave the single market, harm our economy, hurt jobs and damage our country. We have got to find the right way of dealing with the movement of people, not the wrong way."

Mr Cameron said: "There are good ways of controlling migration and there are bad ways. A good way is doing what I did in my renegotiation - which hasn't come into effect yet and will if we stay in the EU - which is to say to people `If you come to our country, first of all you don't claim unemployment benefit, after six months if you haven't got a job you have to leave, and when you do get a job you have to work for four years, paying into the system, before you get full access to our welfare system'.

"I think we should welcome the fact that people want to come to our country, work hard, make a contribution, pay into our system, but they ought to pay in before they get out. And that's what I've secured through my negotiation. No more something for nothing."

Mr Cameron added: "We are in a single market. It is a market of 500 million people. It is vital to the success of our businesses. Part of that single market is British people being able to work and live in other European countries and Europeans being able to live and work in our country.

"If you want to get out of the single market, which is what the Leave campaign want to do, you will fundamentally damage our economy. That cannot be the right way of controlling immigration. It would make our economy smaller, it would cost jobs, we would be poorer as a country.

"That would have a real effect on people watching this show - fewer jobs, we'd see prices go up because the pound would go down, the cost of the weekly shop would go up."

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