If you heard Keir Starmer deliver his first speech as prime minister at the Labour party conference this week, you might have caught his claim about immigration.

He told delegates there’s been “a 23 per cent increase in returns of people who have no right to be here, compared with last summer”.

FactCheck asked the Home Office for the source of this figure. They told us that although they believe it’s correct, the data Sir Keir’s referring to hasn’t been published yet.

The Home Office told us the figures relate to the Immigration system statistics quarterly release – but the publication that would stand up the prime minister’s claim isn’t until November.

This means we can’t verify whether it’s correct.

Which is why the UK statistics regulator says politicians shouldn’t make claims about data that isn’t in the public domain.

Whenever figures are quoted publicly by ministers or officials, “the figures should be released at the same time,” the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) wrote in February 2021.

So it seems the prime minister has broken the OSR’s rules on statistical disclosures.

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