A Question of Numbers or of Kind?

David Aaronovitch’s column in the Times today is excellent. Worthy of three cheers.

I should say here that the ONS begins every such report with the explicit warning that its projections are not forecasts, as Mr [Frank] Field claims, but projections forward of recent trends.[Empasis added] When I spoke to him yesterday Mr Field essentially dismissed this as nit-picking. I think he’s wrong. …What Mr Field didn’t point out — because his intention is propagandist, not informative — was that the 2008 projection was a reduction (albeit small) from the 2006 one. Nor did he mention that the last actual figures, for 2008, showed net inward migration of only 118,000, far below the ONS projection. And even these numbers are likely to be substantially undercut by figures out next month for April 2008 to March 2009. Broadly the ONS assumptions have been based on an unparalleled period of growth. They don’t speculate on what might happen if things change.