Exposed: the lies and slurs of the xenophobes

We were told by the xenophobic press that the accession of 10 new countries to the European Union on 1 May this year, and the freedom granted to their citizens to come and work in Britain, would be a disaster for this country. It insinuated that Britain would be overwhelmed by welfare cheats and criminals. The Daily Express warned us to brace ourselves for "the great exodus".

But now, six months after accession, this has been exposed as the crude propaganda it always was. Statistics released by the Home Office yesterday demonstrate the enormous benefits EU enlargement has brought to this country. Workers from the former eastern bloc have contributed £120m to our economy. They paid £20m in tax, and we are all wealthier as a result. And the effect on our welfare system? Just 16 people qualified for income-related benefits. So much for the notion that millions would come to sponge off our welfare state - 96 per cent of the incomers are in full-time employment.

The number of people who have chosen to come to work Britain is higher than the Government's original estimates, and this was seized upon, rather desperately, by the Shadow Home Secretary, David Davis, as evidence that his party's doom-mongering over EU enlargement had been right all along. But 90,950 people hardly amounts to a "great exodus" from the east. It is important to bear in mind that many of these people were already in Britain. Some have since returned home.

The arguments of the anti-immigration lobby have been thoroughly discredited. The fact that all these immigrants have found work is incontrovertible evidence that our economy needs them. Many were taken on in hospitality, catering and crop harvesting, sectors that have long been short of workers. We should be pleased that so many Poles, Lithuanians, Latvians, Slovaks - and many others - have been prepared to travel to Britain to fill the gaps in our domestic labour market.

From now on let us hear no more xenophobic rants about the citizens of our fellow European states, and a little more gratitude for the increasing contribution they make to our national prosperity.