It's young workers, not retirees, looking to move abroad

Around 350,000 people left the UK to live in a different country for at least a year in 2011, according to the latest official figures released from the Home Office, with British citizens accounting for some 43pc (149,000) of those looking for a new life abroad.

The figures, released in the Home Office report Emigration from the UK, showed that the vast majority of those moving overseas (72pc) were migrating because of their work, with a higher proportion of people in professional or managerial positions leaving the UK. The report stated: “Australia has consistently been the most popular destination country for British emigrants over the last 20 years.

“Other key destinations for British emigrants include Spain, the US, France, Germany, Canada and New Zealand. An estimated 4.7 million UK-born people live abroad with the largest stocks in Australia, the US, Canada, Spain and Ireland.

“The UK ranks eighth highest in the world in terms of the number of its nationals living abroad.”

The report also said that the majority of British people emigrating abroad are of working age (89 per cent in 2008 to 2010).

“Despite this, much research on UK emigration has focused on those retiring overseas, particularly within Europe,” it said. “There was a sharp increase in British people over retirement age moving abroad in 2005 and 2006, reaching a peak of 22,000 in 2006. This has since fallen back to previous levels of around 4,000 to 8,000 retired British people emigrating each year.

“The growth in house values in the UK compared with elsewhere in Europe may have enabled British property owners to sell up and live more cheaply abroad, while enjoying a better climate and quality of life. However, this may have changed since the recession.”

Interestingly, the number of Britons who move abroad when unemployment is high actually falls, while it increases when unemployment falls. This, said the report’s authors, may seem “counter-intuitive but might be partly due to unemployed people having fewer resources to fund a move abroad, and also due to simultaneous downturns in the economies of some of the key destinations for British emigrants”.

The report continued: “This association varies depending on where people are emigrating to, with the relationship appearing stronger among those emigrating to the EU – dominated by flows to Spain and France – in the mid- to late-2000s and weaker among those going to the US.

“It might imply that economic recovery both in the UK and in key destination countries would lead to more British citizens emigrating for work.”

Interestingly, nearly two thirds of those who emigrated from the UK in 2010 were single, and far outweighed those who were married (37pc) and the 2pc who were either widowed or divorced. A slightly higher proportion of women than men – 55pc compared to 45pc – emigrated that same year.

The most popular country to emigrate to for the long-term was Australia, with nearly half of the people who emigrated there saying they planned to stay for at least four years. But France and Spain came a close second for long-term British migrants.