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Sponsoring a foreign worker isn’t cheap. Application fees and visa taxes typically run to thousands of pounds. Since the UK left the European Union, the costs of sponsorship have also applied to employers who want to hire EU workers under the Po ...

My textbook on refugee law, imaginatively entitled Refugee Law, is published today. It is aimed principally at undergraduate and graduate students on refugee law courses, or related courses where students need to learn about refugee law and the protec ...

This decision forms the next episode in the saga of cases arising from the Test of English for International Communication (“TOEIC”) certificates obtained from test centres in the United Kingdom administering tests set by the Educational T ...

For a UK immigration application to be considered at all, it must be valid. Whether an applicant meets the criteria is a moot point if this first, fundamental requirement isn’t met. Validity is a bit like oxygen: all things being well, it is invisib ...

Are you a “foreign criminal” if you were a British citizen when convicted and sentenced, but you’ve lost that citizenship by the time the Home Office decides to deport you? Yes, said the Court of Appeal in Zulfiqar v Secretary of State f ...

Ali v The Home Office [2022] EWHC 866 (QB) is a successful appeal against the Central London County Court’s decision to dismiss the false imprisonment claim of a recognised Afghan refugee, detained for 98 days under the Detained Fast Track proc ...

The Home Office has finally published details of the requirements for sponsors in the UK Expansion Worker visa category. Part of the Global Business Mobility family, it replaces the Sole Representative visa — but how effectively does it fill thi ...

The government has announced a deal to export the UK’s responsibility to assess asylum claims and host refugees to Rwanda. Boris Johnson said in a speech that “anyone entering the UK illegally, as well as those who have arrived illegally s ...

The UK-Rwanda memorandum of understanding on asylum processing is now available. It sets out the terms of the agreement between the countries at a high level but provides some insight into how this scheme is supposed to work. Before removal Importantl ...

Imagine you are a Ukrainian refugee. Imagine you have left your home, your job, and almost all of your possessions behind. Perhaps your husband or son or father — or perhaps all of them — have stayed behind to fight. You head for the neare ...

How broadly does the decision in R (Afzal) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2021] EWCA Civ 1909 protect applicants from the catastrophic consequences of becoming an overstayer after making an invalid application to extend immigration perm ...

The Court of Appeal has held that the unlawful removal of a vulnerable Afghan child and the 18 months of disruption to his private life entitles him to damages under the Human Rights Act 1998 and under EU law. The case is QH (Afghanistan) v Secretary ...

A successful application for asylum or humanitarian protection in the UK results in the grant of five years’ permission to stay, on what is known as a “protection route”. People granted permission on a protection route then need to a ...

There is no hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, and British and Irish citizens are able to cross the land border freely. Section 11(4) of the Immigration Act 1971 means that journeys within the Common Travel Area — ...

Welcome to episode 99 of the Free Movement immigration update podcast. This month we start with statements of changes to the Immigration Rules on Ukraine, ten-year routes to settlement and the suite of new business visas. I then try not to get too cro ...

Deciding whether someone is of good character in the context of a citizenship application is up to the Home Office. Getting that decision overturned in the courts is likely to be very difficult. This is what we learn from the Court of Appeal’s decis ...

The updated list of fees for immigration and nationality applications that apply from 6 April 2022 shows that most visas and extensions are up £15. Citizenship and sponsor licence rates are unchanged.  Headline application fees had been largely froz ...

The Seasonal Worker route is one of those visas in the Temporary Worker family, allowing people to come to the UK for short stints without the right to stay long term. Seasonal Worker visas made up over half (55%) of all temporary worke ...

A new law preventing migrants from using their residence permits to prove their right to rent or work in the UK is coming into force without robust parliamentary debate.  From 6 April 2022, no migrant in the UK will be able to use their biometric res ...

The Home Office has been ordered to make a decision in principle on an Afghan judge’s visa before making him come out of hiding to lodge a formal application. The case is R (JZ) v Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affa ...

When the Nationality and Borders Bill returns to the House of Lords later today, it will contain a registration provision allowing direct descendants of those born on the Chagos Islands to become British nationals. The Chagossians will be entitled to ...

How is the Home Office doing with implementing the lessons it is supposed to have learned from the Windrush scandal? In March 2020, the independent Wendy Williams review of the department called for root and branch reform; the Home Secretary said that ...

The Home Office has agreed to withdraw its decision to refuse asylum to a Ukrainian man who evaded the military draft, meaning that an appeal from the country guidance decision of PK and OS (basic rules of human conduct) Ukraine CG [2020] UKUT 314 wil ...

The High Court in COL v Director of Public Prosecutions [2022] EWHC 601 (Admin) has taken the Crown Prosecution Service to task for its decision not to charge the alleged traffickers of a victim of modern slavery. The claimant, a national of the Phil ...

The Home Office is writing two special visa schemes for Ukrainians into the Immigration Rules and adding a third for people already here. Statement of changes HC 1220 codifies the existing Ukraine Family Scheme and Homes for Ukraine Scheme (described ...

As a result of the almost aggressively complex way our immigration system works, not just in law but procedure as well, Ukrainians applying under the Ukraine Family Scheme or Homes for Ukraine may appear to be granted less time in the UK than they wer ...

Under EU free movement law, British citizens who had been exercising “treaty rights” in the European Economic Area and then decided to move back to the UK could sponsor their family members to come with them. This allowed them to use the friendlie ...

The High Court has held that the Home Office’s search for and seizure of mobile phones from migrants who arrived by small boats from France, and the retention of extracted data, was unlawful. The case is R (HM, MA, KH) v Secretary of State for the H ...

The UK government has published changes to the Immigration Rules introducing the Global Business Mobility visa. They come into force on 11 April 2022 and provide new solutions for overseas firms transferring staff to the UK. Announcing the route last ...

Before 1 January 2021, British and EU citizens did not require a visa to travel across the Channel on a business trip. This is largely still the case post-Brexit, so we’ve been left with the appearance that nothing has really changed from a legal pe ...

Is the Home Office under a duty to provide information establishing a child’s nationality? This is the question considered by the Inner House of the Court of Session in AS v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2022] CSIH 16. Unfortunately, t ...