Union could result in a reduction of annual net migration from 180,000 to around 65,000, although added that such a number should not be taken as a "precise estimate" but was "intended to illustrate the scale of the potential reduction under the policy outlined". MigrationWatch stated that they would not take a position on the UK's EU membership referendum held in June 2016. In 2017 the group backed the idea of visa-free travel between the UK and EU after Brexit, adding that EU citizens who would want to work in the UK should need a work permit. Hong Kong After the British government reacted to the Hong Kong national security law, announcing that British National (Overseas) passport holders in Hong Kong would be given the right to live, study and work in the UK and would be offered a route to route to citizenship, MigrationWatch published a paper stating that "a Home Office factsheet confirmed that the number who might eventually be able to come is up to 2.9 million – the current number of BNOs residing in Hong Kong". The paper argued that the government had "cast the proposed offer of a pathway to citizenship as part and parcel with the UK honouring its 'historical responsibilities'", suggesting that this set a dangerous precedent. Chris Whitehouse, responding to the MigrationWatch paper in an article for CapX, argued that "the UK's historic duty towards Hong Kong is very different to other former colonies; and the future of Hongkongers is based on China keeping its word, which it is brazenly failing to do". He concluded that "Lord Andrew Green and Migration Watch are out of step with the nation on this one, and they should urgently consult Lord Patten on their route ahead if they are not to lose their way". Reaction to the group Praise Conservative politician Jonathan Aitken has credited MigrationWatch with improving the quality of the British debate on immigration. He argues that "Migrationwatch has changed the administrative practices of the civil service and the policies of the major political parties on asylum seekers, work permit criteria and numerical totals. It has introduced integrity and accuracy into the previously misleading government statistics on immigration. The level of understanding of the subject in all serious newspapers and broadcasting organizations has been improved. Britain may or may not have the right answers to immigration questions, but we certainly now have a