Author Archive

The requirement for criminal defendants to give their nationality in court is corrupting the justice system and gives the impression of bias against ethnic minorities, a new report has found. Commons, a non-profit criminal defence firm, says that the ...

The coronavirus pandemic could cause more refugees to flee to Europe, a European Union report has warned. The European Asylum Support Office says that an ISIS resurgence and other conflicts linked to the outbreak may see European countries handling mo ...

Immigration lawyers are warning that changes to legal aid for appeals lodged online during the coronavirus pandemic “will do irreparable harm”. The Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association (ILPA) says that adjustments to legal aid ...

The Home Office has decided to make it more difficult for European residents to become British citizens. EU citizens with settled status who apply for naturalisation may now have to provide evidence that they have been living in the UK legally, accord ...

The European Commission has formally accused the UK government of breaching EU law on free movement of people. Brussels today launched “infringement proceedings” against the UK, the process used to force EU member countries to comply with ...

Listeners to the Free Movement podcast may have heard us mention the Immigration Bill on the last episode. The second reading was scheduled for 21 April, and we thought (and said) that it would go ahead remotely despite the coronavirus disruption. In ...

The High Court has ruled that the government must make it easier for migrants to access the welfare system if they are about to become destitute. In an oral ruling delivered this morning, Lord Justice Bean and Mr Justice Chamberlain found that Home Of ...

The Home Office tried to put pressure on judges to stop releasing migrants from immigration detention, it has emerged. An official letter from the department to a top immigration judge said that the Home Office was “somewhat surprised” tha ...

The Home Office has published some guidance on helping children in care apply for post-Brexit immigration status through the EU Settlement Scheme. It reminds social workers that they must either apply on the child’s behalf, or help older childre ...

The Court of Appeal has rejected an appeal by Turkish business owners challenging a reduction in their settlement rights. The case is R (Alliance of Turkish Business People Ltd) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2020] EWCA Civ 553. Self-em ...

More on the mysterious legal power that the Home Secretary claims to have to grant automatic visa extensions to foreign NHS workers. Asked about the legal basis for automatic extensions by MPs on the Home Affairs Committee this morning, Priti Patel sa ...

Last month’s High Court ruling on coronavirus and immigration detention is now available: R (Detention Action & Anor) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2020] EWHC 732 (Admin). Detention Action, a charity, launched a judicial revi ...

The government has won its appeal against last year’s High Court decision that the Right to Rent policy is unlawful. The case is Secretary of State for the Home Department v R (Joint Council for The Welfare of Immigrants) [2020] EWCA Civ 542. In ...

The government’s furlough scheme went live today, 20 April 2020. Under what is officially known as the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, the state will pay 80% of staff wage costs (up to £2,500 a month) so long as employers keep people on the b ...

There is no way of telling how many EU citizens will be left living illegally in the UK because of Brexit, a new report has concluded. The Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford says that the government doesn’t collect or release the ...

The Home Office evicted an asylum seeker with mental health problems and symptoms of COIVD-19, leaving him on the streets for over a week, it has emerged. The man has since been rehoused by order of the High Court, but his lawyers say the incident is ...

The Senior President of Tribunals has issued a new Practice Statement on the powers of lawyers who work directly for the Upper Tribunal. The document replaces an older version from December 2013. The new one “widens the functions delegated to UT ...

A leading migrants’ rights charity says that it will close “in the next few months” unless an emergency fundraising appeal succeeds. Consonant, the newish name for what was Asylum Aid and the Migrants Resource Centre, says that it is ...

Arshad Bano’s appeal for leave to remain in the UK on human rights grounds was listed for 13 December 2018, with documents to be submitted no later than five days in advance. She provided a statement on 10 December, a couple of days late. In res ...

No sooner is the last batch of immigration judges through the door than the authorities are seeking to recruit more. Around 40 new judges were named to the immigration and asylum chamber of the First-tier Tribunal over the last few months, but the Jud ...

Barristers working in the immigration tribunal say that emergency measures to keep hearings going are “unworkable”. Members of the immigration bar have written to First-tier Tribunal President Michael Clements to express deep concern about ...

The Home Office has accepted the need to simplify the “complex and confusing” Immigration Rules and says that the work is already underway. In an official response to the Law Commission’s recent report on the subject, the department ...

What caused the Windrush scandal? According to an independent review by Wendy Williams, published today, the answer lies in increasingly harsh immigration and nationality legislation over the past 60 years. These laws — including those dedicated ...

Once upon a time, the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 required the government to “seek to negotiate” a deal with the EU on family reunion for child refugees. Without such a deal, the looming end of the Dublin III arrangements will mak ...

The High Court has granted a Female Genital Mutilation Protection Order in the case of a 10-year-old girl who the Home Office is trying to remove to Bahrain. The case is A (A child) (Female Genital Mutilation Protection Order Application) [2020] EWHC ...

EU citizens do not have to prove that they have a “genuine chance of being engaged” in order to retain worker status under European Union law, the Upper Tribunal has held. The case is KH v Bury MBC and SSWP [2020] UKUT 50 (AAC). Martin Wil ...

The Home Office has updated its guidance on Surinder Singh cases to remove all reference to a “centre of life” test. This follows the case of ZA (Reg 9. EEA Regs; abuse of rights) Afghanistan [2019] UKUT 281 (IAC) in which the Upper Tribu ...

The Home Office has announced an extension of funding to help vulnerable EU citizens to apply for settled status. £8 million will be made available for charities and councils working to get people through the EU Settlement Scheme in 2020/21, a slight ...

An Immigration Bill will be introduced to the House of Commons later today, the government has announced. It is expected to be similar to the one introduced in 2018 by then Home Secretary Sajid Javid, which ultimately lapsed when the Johnson governmen ...

Check out this hilarious bit of spin in the Home Office’s “factsheet” on yesterday’s immigration statistics: …the UK continues to be a desirable location for the brightest and best around the world… The number of hi ...

The Home Office is “managing relatively comfortably” with the millions of European residents applying for post-Brexit settled status, a long-awaited review has found. The department finally published the results today of an inspection of t ...

The number of people with pending asylum cases has risen by almost 50% in just the last 12 months, new Home Office figures show. Over 56,000 asylum seekers and their dependants were awaiting an initial decision or further review at the end of 2019, co ...

Ronnie Latayan came to the UK from the Philippines on a visit visa in 2004 and has been here ever since, through multiple unsuccessful applications for further leave to remain. Now 46, Ms Latayan lives with her mother, a naturalised British citizen wi ...

Outsourcing firm Serco is to take over two immigration removal centres run by rival G4S, the Home Office has announced. The Hampshire-headquartered company, which already runs the notorious Yarl’s Wood detention centre, will take over Brook Hous ...

The government has released a few more details of what it calls a “points based system” for immigration to the UK after Brexit. To balance out the impending end of free movement of workers from the European Union, it would allow employers ...

The Public Law Project has a new briefing on EU citizens’ rights during the transition period. It says: The main takeaway is that throughout the transition period, until 31 December 2020, almost all EU rules will continue to apply in the UK. The ...

Suella Braverman was appointed Attorney General today, replacing Geoffrey Cox QC. She is only the second woman to become the government’s chief legal adviser. The role also involves oversight of the Crown Prosecution Service and Government Legal ...

The Home Office incorrectly put long-term UK residents on a removal list for the best part of a year, the immigration inspector has found. In a report published yesterday, the Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration reveals that for mos ...

Shamima Begum is a citizen of Bangladesh and so would not be made stateless by being stripped of her British citizenship, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission has held. The main SIAC judgment is Shamima Begum (Preliminary Issue : Substansive) [2 ...

The Home Office should release more details about a “cryptic” computer programme that scores visa applicants as high, medium and low risk, the immigration inspector has recommended. David Bolt says that while applicants labelled high risk ...