The number of Romanians and Bulgarians working in the UK has increased 15% year-on-year in the last quarter of 2014, official figures have revealed.

Unemployment numbers, however, have continued to fall, dispelling fears a major influx of workers from the two countries, which joined the EU in 2007, would hit Britain's own labour force.

Employment curbs were lifted for citizens of the two countries on 1 Januarylast year, prompting warnings of a surge of immigration from the right-wing UK Independence Party (UKIP) led by Nigel Farage.

About 172,000 nationals of Bulgaria and Romania were working in the UK between October and December, up 22,000 on the same period a year earlier.

The total number of EU workers in the UK rose by 200,000, or 10.5%, reaching almost 1.9 million. The biggest increase was recorded among migrants from the eight eastern European countries that joined the EU in 2004.

At the same time, UK jobless numbers decreased by 97,000 on the year in the last three months of 2014, reaching a seven-year low of 1.86 million, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said on Wednesday.

The number of people with a job increased by 103,000 to almost 31 million, or 73.2%t of British adults - the highest since records began in 1971.

Average earnings including bonuses also increased, rising 2.1% on the year when compared to the last three months of 2013. Total pay was also up, increasing by 2.4% year-on-year in December.

Despite the figures showing that EU immigration does not cause a rise in unemployment or a fall in pay, UKIP keeps claiming that eastern European immigration should be feared.

The wave of eastern European migration is likely to have been triggered by the relatively buoyant British economy, which grew by 2.7% in 2014, The Guardian commented in its coverage of the news.