Damian Green: Britain has become addicted to immigration Mr Green said Britain remains open to skilled migrants but called on businesses to kick the "habit" of immigration and hire British-born workers. "Like all addictions, it takes some time to wean people off but it's good for you to be weaned off an addiction and it will be good for business in the long run if we have more of an instinct that's, "Let's find a British worker and, if necessary, let's train a British worker,"" Mr Green said. He added: "If you have skills and talents that Britain needs, then absolutely, we welcome you with open arms. If you haven't, then we don't. His comments echo observations by Boris Johnson, Mayor of London, on the 'Pret A Manger phenomenon', by which many businesses such as cafes and dry cleaners are staffed by migrants while young Britons are unemployed. He added cutting immigration from 250,000 to the Conservative Party's target of 100,000 by 2015 will be like "turning around an oil tanker." "We deliberately set ourselves a five-year target: we always knew that it was going to take the parliament because we could see the net migration figures rising," he said. He said curbing immigration is a "progressive Conservative policy" because it helps the poorest in Britain. It is actually in some of the poor areas of our inner cities that you get these social tensions that are no good to anyone on either side of them. And relieving those tensions, therefore, is a policy to help some of the more disadvantaged areas of this country," he told the Financial Times. Last week the government introduced new rules that said only those who earn more than £35,000 can stay in the country for more than five years. The policy will bring the "brightest and best" workers to the country while keeping lower-skilled jobs free for Britain's 1m unemployed, Mr Green said.