Poll: Brits Would Prefer Controlling Immigration to EU Free Trade

Brits would rather have greater controls on immigration than access to free trade with the European Union (EU), a poll has found.

Pollster ORB found that 46 per cent agree that stronger borders are preferable to free trade with EU nations, compared to 39 per cent who disagree.

Britons are also optimistic about the country’s future outside of the European Union, with 44 per cent saying the country will be better off economically, with 33 per cent thinking it will worse.

Nearly 60 per cent also agree that the country will have more control over immigration, while just 23 per cent disagree.

However, in a warning to the government as it prepares to trigger Article 50, the public are evenly divided as to whether ministers will get the right deal for Britain, with 35 agreeing and the same percentage disagreeing.

The poll comes as the government continues to waver over whether Britain should leave the European Single Market.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Theresa May hinted that Britain may leave the Single Market in order to regain control over immigration, saying Britain won’t try to keep “bits of membership” once it leaves the bloc.

However, the Prime Minister then rowed back on the comments on Monday, saying that a clean break with the Single Market is “not inevitable”.

“I’m tempted to say that the people who are getting it wrong are those who print things saying I’m talking about a hard Brexit, (that) it is absolutely inevitable there’s a hard Brexit,” she said.

“I don’t accept the terms hard and soft Brexit. What we’re doing is (that we are) going to get an ambitious, good, best possible deal for the United Kingdom in terms of … trading with and operating within the single European market.”