Seven in 10 believe Britain has too many immigrants

Three in four agreed that immigration has placed too much pressure on public services while three in five agreed that it had made it harder for Britons to get jobs.

Just one in four thought immigration had been good for the economy, the survey of 1,000 people showed.

Prime Minister David Cameron has said he wants to cut net migration from the current 242,000 to the levels of the 1990s when the number of people coming to the UK was in the “tens of thousands, rather than the hundreds of thousands”.

But the leader of the UK Independence party, Nigel Farage, said: “These findings show what real people care about and immigration has long been the elephant in the room for both this Government and the last.

“Nothing can be done to halt those arriving in the UK from other EU countries, which is a problem that should not be glossed over when you consider that David Cameron is keen for Turkey to join the EU, a country with a population of around 75 million.

“As for non-EU immigration, the existing controls in place are shambolic.”

Despite the major political parties seeking to downplay the issue of immigration during the general election campaign last year, many candidates were struck by how often it was raised by the public.

The Tories are adamant that plans put in place by the coalition will see a cap on the number of immigrants coming to the UK and insist they want net migration reduced from hundreds of thousands of people per year to tens of thousands.

The Global @dvisor survey of more than 17,000 people in 23 countries showed that only Russians (77 per cent) and Belgians (72 per cent) were more likely than Britons (71 per cent) to agree that there were too many immigrants in their country (77 per cent do so).

The Japanese were the happiest with their current level of immigration, just 15 per cent agreeing that there were too many immigrants in Japan.

Immigration Minister Damian Green said: “For too long immigration was allowed to get out of control and we are taking action to reduce net migration back to the tens of thousands.

“In the past year we have introduced an annual limit on the number of non-European workers able to come to the UK and overhauled student visas. We are currently consulting on restricting settlement rights and the family route.”

Sir Andrew Green, chairman of campaign group MigrationWatch UK, said: “This is further overwhelming evidence that the British public remain deeply concerned about immigration.

“This poll is a timely reminder that the Government must keep its pledge to get immigration down to tens of thousands or pay a very heavy price with public opinion.”