THIS baby, five days old and yet to be given a name, is among the latest warm and cuddly additions to Thailand's massive immigration dilemma.

Born to a Burmese mother and father in a hospital on the holiday island of Phuket, the boy is likely to grow up unschooled, stateless and, even with loving parents, unwanted and rejected.

The father of 'Baby A' is a legal immigrant worker on Phuket, but his mother is an illegal worker who could be arrested and expelled at any time.

Increasing numbers of poor and oppressed Burmese are risking extortion and possible death to forsake their homeland for a chance at a better life in Thailand. Such is the growing scale of the migration that so far this year, about half the births at Phuket's Vachira Hospital, three hours' drive south of the Thailand-Burma border, are to Burmese mothers.

There was a time, one nurse at the hospital told us, when a pregnant Burmese came in, wanting to give birth, hospital records showed, for the second time in two months. ''We realised then that something had to be done,'' the nurse said. ''The ID card system clearly needed to change.''

Even with a charge now of 6000 baht for natural births and 12,000 baht for caesarians, the swollen-bellied Burmese keep coming here to give birth: 50 in January, 43 in February, 40 in March, 55 in April, 49 in May and 58 in June.

Estimates of the number of Burmese now living on Phuket run as high as 200,000, with births to match, and Vachira is just one of Phuket's handful of hospitals. Add reports that an illegal school will open soon for Phuket's Burmese children to the news that one big Thai bank has introduced ATM instructions in the Thai and Burmese languages, and it's plain that a social revolution is underway.

As Burmese immigrants sneak or are smuggled by the thousands down the popular Andaman holiday coast from the border towards Phuket, corrupt Thai officials cash in on the exploding numbers, extorting money, trading the least fortunate into labor servitude or even, in some cases, benefiting from forms of sexual slavery.

If Thailand has a policy to manage the immigration invasion, it is being smothered by abuse.

Phuket exemplifies the quandary for Thailand, with property developers demanding ever-increasing numbers of lowly-paid laborers, but only limited legal workers available. From early morning on Phuket, crowded pickups and vans truck Burmese by the thousands to construction sites all over the island.

Yet most of the workers, who often bring their families to Phuket with them, have no right to be here.

The president of the Phuket Chamber of Commerce, Dr Sirichai Silpa-Ar-Cha, told Phuketwan: ''The Government must give Burmese immigrant workers legitimate status or push them back. But first, the Government has to deal with the corruption within the whole process.

''Corruption is destroying any hope of a workable system.

''These children will grow up learning Thai culture, and speaking Thai. They will have no ties to Burma any more. For most of them, it will be a place they have never been. Will the Government continue to deny them Thai citizenship, then push them back to a country where they have no connections, where they cannot even speak the language?''

The issue is more sharply in focus in Ranong, on the border with Burma, where supermarket signage is in three languages, Thai, Burmese and English, and where there are more than a dozen illegal schools that have been operating for so long that teachers are now considering establishing a secret tertiary college.

Phuketwan visited one covert Burmese primary school and was impressed at the high standard of English being taught there - a language skill that will eventually equip children of Burmese parentage for better jobs in Thai restaurants and resorts along the Andaman coast.

On Phuket, the numbers tell the story: More than 7000 construction sites employ 120,000 Burmese, yet only 64,000 are officially sanctioned. Of those, 27,300 have sought ''validation'' under the new system introduced last year. And only the minuscule figure of 114 have had that validation process actually completed.

The Thai-Burma border remains long and porous, and corrupt Immigration officials are only too happy to help Burmese workers arrested in farcical crackdowns to perform a rapid u-turn and try their luck anew through what's known as the ''revolving door'' . . . for a price.

The director of Phuket's Labor Office, Noppadon Ploy-Audee, was among officials from all over Thailand who met with Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva yesterday in Bangkok in search of a solution.

Back at Vachira Hospital on Phuket, another Burmese mother-to-be was going into labor of a different kind.