By Will Smale BBC News

The councils say the number of migrants is underestimated

Westminster City Council is one of four local authorities to have told the Treasury that the number of migrant workers in the UK is being underestimated.

Westminster says it needs more accurate counts and additional funds to cope, but what council services are migrant workers eligible for? And what problems is Westminster facing?

Hundreds of migrant workers arrive at Victoria coach station in central London each week - it is one of the main entry points for eastern Europeans seeking employment in the UK.

And although most of the new arrivals will quickly spread out across the UK, being the first port of call can create special problems for the local authority - Westminster City Council.

While most migrant workers that pass through Victoria find work, the minority that don't can quickly find themselves homeless and penniless.

This is not an anti-migration issue, we just need the extra funds to cope with the additional strain on our services Councillor Colin Barrow, Westminster deputy leader

It then becomes the responsibility of Westminster to look after them, find them a bed in a homeless shelter or some other accommodation.

This inevitably puts pressure on Westminster's social services budget, which already has to deal with a much larger than average number of homeless people.

For Councillor Colin Barrow, Westminster's deputy leader, this extra cost to his council is just one example of how the influx of migrant workers from eastern Europe is putting additional pressure on the budgets of local governments across the country.

He says that while local authorities are there to provide services for all their residents - regardless of where they originally came from - they need extra funds from central government.

Schools to rubbish

But exactly what services must councils offer migrant workers?

Migrant workers increase the workload of all council departments

The answer is pretty much the same as for any local resident - everything from school places for their children, to collecting their rubbish, access to swimming pools and other leisure facilities, and if needed social services support.

In addition, migrant workers may wish to sign up for an adult education course, apply for a parking permit, join a library, or become pregnant and need to register the birth.

A few may put extra pressure on a council's work to combat anti-social behaviour or alcohol and drug problems.

And if all these services are being used to bursting point, local authorities need more staff to cope, say Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham, Kensington & Chelsea, and Slough councils, who wrote to the Treasury.

One of the few things migrant workers are not eligible for, at least for their first two years of residence, is access to council accommodation.

Yet as Westminster City Council points out, it has a statutory duty to help those migrants in desperate need of housing.

"It is important to stress that migrants are people first, and migrants second," says Mr Barrow. "This is not an anti-migration issue, we just need the extra funds to cope with the additional strain on our services."

'Budget shortfall'

For Mr Barrow, education is a main pressure area, and his council estimates that migrant families will contribute to a 10% increase in required school places within Westminster from 2005 to 2010.

"If people come into this country with children, then need a place in school," he says.

"This not only puts pressure on the schools themselves, but also on the administration staff within the housing departments."

He concludes that under current government calculations of the number of migrants within its boundaries, Westminster City Council's budget will be up to �6m short next year.

Yet the difficulty for the four signature councils is that they do not have any figures of their own for exactly how many migrant workers live within their boundaries.

Westminster says it is now looking at how best to calculate its own figures.

Yet as a spokesman for Hammersmith & Fulham admits, this will be difficult to do.

"If someone uses our services, we don't ask where they come from," he says.

"Most migrant workers are working hard and paying their taxes. We just need more of this money to be passed down to local government."