UK Ministers closed the door to Bulgarians and Romanians hoping to live and work in Britain on Tuesday as the British government tries to deflect criticism that it has lost control of the immigration system, The Guardian reported.

The move, which maintains the tight controls introduced last year, means they are still being refused the rights given to migrants from six other eastern European accession countries.

The Foreign Office has raised protests in Whitehall, but pressure to act has been driven by the scale of recent migration projections and concern that the issue is a big negative factor for the Labour party in its private polling. The government's advisory Migration Impacts Forum told ministers this month that immigration is now seen as the number one issue facing Britain.

The government hopes to neutralise the issue in the new year with the introduction of an Australian-style points system for migrants who want work in key sectors of the economy hit by labour shortages.

Ministers were forced to reveal yesterday that they had revised figures for the increase in the number of foreign nationals working in the UK since 1997 from 800,000 to 1.1 million.

Foreign nationals now account for between 7% and 8% of the 29.1 million people in work in the UK.

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