Author: Chris Desira

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Chris Desira

Christopher Desira is the Director of Seraphus (www.seraphus.co.uk). Chris is experienced in all areas of immigration and offers legal advice and services via Free Movement. He is the advisor on Brexit immigration issues to the European Union and to European embassies. He is a trustee of Settled and regularly supports the wider charity sector. He regularly provides media comment and is happy to be contacted by journalists. Chris tweets from @cldesira.

From 1 July 2021, EU, EEA and Swiss citizens living in the UK without having applied for pre-settled or settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme will be here unlawfully. The Home Secretary confirmed a few months ago that people can apply after that deadline, but they must have “reasonable...

12th April 2021
BY Chris Desira

Human beings crossing the English Channel are making headlines again. The number of people who reach the UK via this extremely difficult, dangerous but lawful route is minuscule, and the total number claiming international protection here insignificant compared with the situation in many other countries, yet these stories continue to...

12th August 2020
BY Chris Desira

The government continues to keep us immigration lawyers on our toes, and everyone else completely flummoxed, with yet another statement of changes to the Immigration Rules. Thankfully, many of these changes are welcome as they plug gaps in the EU Settlement Scheme. But it is difficult to keep up with...

13th March 2020
BY Chris Desira

Another statement of changes to the Immigration Rules (HC 170) was laid on 24 October 2019. The changes relate to Appendix EU of the Rules and their functioning in a no-deal Brexit scenario. This is somewhat surprising given recent events. Jacob Rees-Mogg said in Parliament on the same date that...

25th October 2019
BY Chris Desira

An EU citizen, or their spouse or civil partner, is entitled to have his or her dependent parent continue to live with them or join them in the UK under the EU Settlement Scheme. This has always been the case since the scheme began. But one particularly confusing aspect, even...

16th September 2019
BY Chris Desira

Yesterday afternoon the government dropped statement of changes to the Immigration Rules HC 2631. This is a formal change to the Immigration Rules and there is a lot to it: the full version weighs in at 102 pages. We’ll deal with other changes in another post (or posts) but here...

10th September 2019
BY Chris Desira

Following Priti Patel’s recent comments about the immediate end of free movement following a no-deal Brexit, the Home Office sent an email reassuring EU citizens that they will continue to be eligible to remain in the UK so long as they apply for the settled status scheme. What the email...

28th August 2019
BY Chris Desira

Confusion abounds after Dominic Cummings sources close to Home Secretary Priti Patel told the Telegraph and Independent over the weekend that free movement of EU citizens would end the day after a no-deal exit on 31 October 2019. While at first glance it seems very unlikely that this means anything...

19th August 2019
BY Chris Desira

Over 900,000 people have applied for EU settled status so far. By the end of June 2019, the Home Office had processed 806,000 applications, granting full settled status in 65% of cases and pre-settled status in 35% of cases. The department says that nobody has been refused status outright. There...

23rd July 2019
BY Chris Desira

The UK government has confirmed what was suspected (and what the Home Office has hinted at in private talks): in the event of a no-deal Brexit, free movement will end on 29 March 2019. EU citizens arriving after this date face a new temporary system. The Immigration and Social Security...

29th January 2019
BY Chris Desira
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