May’s got as much chance of cutting immigration as I’ve got of pulling Kristen Stewart

HERE’S something to cheer you up. There may be almost one million more EU migrants working in this country than the Government thinks there is.

That’s because the Government is incapable of counting.

This is all according to a former top civil servant, a bloke called Jonathan Portes. He reckons the Government has been out by about 900,000 people.

Yes, that’s right. Somehow the authorities have mislaid about three cities the size of Leicester.

That’s a scandal, isn’t it?

Meanwhile, the new official immigration figures show that our population has just increased by another 327,000. That’s the people coming in who we know about.

It seems there is nothing the Government can do to reduce the endless flow. Prime Minister Theresa May has even given up pretending we might one day cut immigration.

She says it’s just an aspiration, not a pledge. Much as I have an aspiration to give one to Kristen Stewart, watch Millwall lift the European Cup and run the 100m in nine seconds.

Three things which I think we can be pretty certain ain’t going to happen. (Although Millwall did beat West Brom’s under-tens the other night, so we’re on our way).

And yet at the same time, a huge majority of the population — more than 70 per cent — want strict controls on immigration. About half of the population want it stopped altogether.

So why can’t the Government do anything about it? If a government can’t even control who comes in and out of its country, what use is it?

You’re maybe thinking: “Ah, yes, but we’re still in the EU. As soon as we’re free of that bureaucratic nightmare, we’ll be able to control our own borders.” Nope. Sorry. It’s still the case that the majority of migrants who come to this country are not from EU countries at all.

They’re from Pakistan and Bangladesh and various other places where, you have to say, the outlook on life is a little different to the one we have here, inshallah.  They’re all bringing their rellies over. A hell of a lot of rellies.

The gross number of people coming into the UK is well over 500,000. But quite a lot of Brits are getting the hell out at the same time, which accounts for the difference. Can’t imagine why they’d want to go, can you?

Mass, uncontrolled immigration is a giant con job perpetrated against the very poorest in our country

Mass, uncontrolled immigration is a giant con job perpetrated against the very poorest in our country.

Successive governments have liked it because it provides a short — very short, and unsustainable — boost to the economy. And Labour liked it for misplaced ideological reasons.

There is no question that if the ­Government seriously wanted to tackle the issue, it could do so. It might begin by trying to count the numbers coming in with a bit more rigour.

But there is no will to do so. You may want it stopped, but the Government doesn’t give a monkey’s.

A vicious cycle, Jez

THE lady driver who verbally attacked the BBC’s Jeremy Vine when he was cycling through London didn’t seem very nice, did she?

“Get out of my f***ing way,” she screamed at him. She even made a gesture that she should like to shoot him. Lordy.

I like Jeremy Vine – he’s a talented and decent bloke. Jeremy posted the encounter online. But I have to say, I have some sympathy with the driver.

Cyclists in cities are getting very arsey and self-righteous indeed.

They’re not just going from A to B – they’re saving the planet and they have RIGHTS!

Here’s a tip Jezza – and any other like-minded Lycra-clad saints on two wheels.

If you’re holding up the traffic, how about you pull over and let a few cars pass?

It’s called politeness, mate.

What happened was character Eva Price went to the hairdresser’s and asked for her roots to be dyed.

And she said to the stylist: “I’ve got more roots than Kunta Kinte.” This was a reference to the central black slave character from Alex Haley’s book, Roots.

The internet went into meltdown with screeched complaints from the usual perpetually outraged cretins.

Listen, you drongos. It is not racist to mention the name of a black person. It is not racist simply to make  a joke which has a black person’s name in it.

What Eva Price said was not racist and people who think it is need to get a bit of a life.

And shame on the channel bosses for apologising.

Too often the shrieking, over-sensitive minority make life a misery for the rest of us.

CAN you imagine spending millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money, every year, on an event where hundreds are arrested, people are stabbed and scores of policemen injured?

That’s what we do for the Notting Hill Carnival. And the result is the same every time.

This summer 43 coppers needed medical treatment and six people were stabbed. The police hate it, residents hate it – and I dare say the people who got stabbed hate it.

Withdraw the funding right now.

Jam for me when I'm toast

APPARENTLY more and more people who pop their clogs are not having religious hymns played at their funerals.

They’re going for popular songs instead.

A big favourite is Frank Sinatra’s rather boring classic, My Way.

Never really liked that song – not even the Sid Vicious version.

When I die I’d like them to play the Dead Kennedys’ Too Drunk  To F***.

I think that would be suitable. Or how about these alternatives . . .

• Rotting In The Free World (Neil Young)
• Going Underground (The Jam)
• Light My Pyre (The Doors)
• Don’t It Make My White Skin Blue (Crystal Gayle)
• I Won’t Survive (Gloria Gaynor)
• Sheer Heart Attack (Queen)
• Natty Dead (Bob Marley)
• Living In A Box (Living In A Box)

SQUIRRELS cover up MURDERS, according to a new and unlikely sounding piece of research.

The creatures scamper around and gnaw through any bones they can find. Including the bones of people who’ve been bumped off.  And this is  a major problem for forensic scientists, apparently.

“Squirrels seem nice but are actually very voracious little creatures,” according to James Pokines, one of the researchers.

They’re only trying to get by, James. Just like the rest of us.

So anyway, if you’re planning  to kill someone, check to make  sure there are lots of squirrels  nearby. And you might get away  with it.

RUSSIAN astronomers think they may have heard a message from aliens.

It was a two-second burst of radiation from a star some 95 light years distant.

If it was a message, it was almost certainly: “P**s off, Putin.”

But my guess is that it’s more likely one of those Russkies was heating up a bowl of borscht in the microwave and forgot to take the metal spoon out.  There’s nothing out there. Just unfathomable miles of desolate, frozen, silence.

A bit like Russia, in fact.