“There was a huge demand to beat the deadline and there were a lot of last-minute applications,” said Vatan Oz, editor of the London-based Avrupa Gazette, which he founded after he came to the UK in 1996.

He said the exodus was also driven by critics of the Erdogan regime and professional people in Turkey seeking to flee the country, adding: “There is a huge pressure on secular modern democratic people – doctors, students and others – because they don’t want to live in Turkey. Over 60,000 or 70,000 have left Turkey in the last five to 10 years.”

There was also the “pull factor” of a large Turkish diaspora, mainly in London, which has grown from 40,000 when Mr Oz arrived in England to more than 700,000 now.

It also coincided with the departure of many Europeans to their home countries – particularly workers from eastern European countries such as Poland, where the economy has been thriving in recent years. Official UK statistics show that around 150,000 Polish citizens have left the UK since the Brexit referendum.

The Government’s new Brexit regime has not only lifted the cap on skilled workers but also reduced the salary threshold to £26,500, lowered the qualifications bar to include A-levels and similar technical qualifications and expanded the shortage occupation list.

“Of course there are more opportunities for Turks if Europeans leave the UK because of Brexit,” said Ali Guden, a British-trained solicitor in Istanbul who has helped many Turkish clients move to the UK. “The Turks want to enter into the market, replacing the Europeans.”

The irony is that the Leave campaign had warned that remaining in the EU could allow 76 million Turks to flood into Britain. Despite the surge, there are, however, relatively high rejection rates of Turkish business people lodging applications under the Ankara agreement.

Madeleine Sumption, director of the Migration Observatory at Oxford University, said the scheme required applicants to submit a business plan along with all the relevant documentation. 

“The fact the rejection rate is high suggests there was probably a reduction in the quality of applications. People putting in last-minute applications may have failed on the business documentation side of the application,” she added.