Final immigration figures before EU referendum to be published

The final set of official immigration figures before the referendum on the European Union will be published on Thursday.

Fresh data will be released on net migration to the UK in the Office For National Statistics' latest quarterly bulletin.

Findings on the number of people arriving from the EU will come under particular scrutiny with the poll on Britain's membership a month away.

The last batch of figures, published in February, showed overall net-long term international migration was running at 323,000 in the year to September.

This was a dip compared to the figure for the 12 months to June, but still close to record levels and well above the Government's aim of less than 100,000.

Net migration of EU citizens was estimated to be 172,000 in the year to September 2015. This was not a "statistically significant" change compared to year ending September 2014, when the number stood at 158,000.

Earlier this month a separate ONS report concluded that migrants coming to Britain for short periods are the main driver behind differences between measures of long-term international migration and National Insurance (NI) numbers given to EU nationals.

The discrepancy had been at the centre of a row amid questions over whether the headline figures were fully capturing the inflow.