Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is being blamed by Tory MPs for a forecast surge in migration – because he has argued privately that it will help to bring down inflation.
Amid continuing fallout from last week’s prediction by the Centre for Policy Studies that net migration could rise to between 700,000 and 997,000 for the year to December, the MPs say that Mr Hunt backs the surge because he hopes it will reduce pressure on wages.
A source said: ‘Hunt’s priority is tackling inflation, but its not going to help us much with voters if there are a million extra migrants here by the time of the next election’.