Author: Sonia Lenegan

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Sonia Lenegan

Sonia Lenegan is an experienced immigration, asylum and public law solicitor. She has been practising for over ten years and was previously legal director at the Immigration Law Practitioners' Association and legal and policy director at Rainbow Migration. Sonia is the Editor of Free Movement.

The Court of Appeal has said that a child, who is over 21 and has rights of residence based on dependency on their EU citizen parent, does not lose those rights if they start working and are no longer financially dependent on the parent. Essentially, dependency is determined at the...

16th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

An unrepresented claimant has been unsuccessful in her challenge to the Home Secretary’s decision to void her indefinite leave to remain application because she submitted a second application to the EU Settlement Scheme. The decision was not communicated to the claimant until it was disclosed during her appeal against the...

13th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

An appeal against the refusal of an asylum claim made by an Iranian man who sought to rely on his attendance at protests in the UK and social media posts has been dismissed by the Court of Appeal. The case is S v Secretary of State for the Home Department...

13th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

A fifth decision on the same application made under the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy has just been quashed on the grounds of unfairness, meaning that a sixth decision will now need to be made. The Foreign Secretary unsuccessfully tried to conceal the names of the civil servants involved. Once...

12th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

Barry returns and joins Sonia to run you through November on Free Movement. It was statistics galore for Sonia who covered the latest immigration, asylum and trafficking figures. A surprise statement of changes contained bad news for Colombians and Ukrainians. Barry was a really big fan of Colin’s review of...

9th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

Following reports of planned concessions around the 31 December 2024 deadline for people to get their eVisas, today Seema Malhotra MP the Minister for Migration and Citizenship has made a written statement. A new media factsheet was also published as well as statistics on the number of eVisa accounts created...

4th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

The High Court has dismissed a judicial review challenging the decision of the Home Secretary to refuse to grant indefinite leave to remain to the claimant, Jeanell Hippolyte, under the Windrush scheme. The case is Hippolyte v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2024] EWHC 2968 (Admin). Claimant’s background...

4th December 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

The statistics for the period July to September 2024 have been published today, showing a very large drop in health and care worker visas, a lesser but still significant drop in students, a fall in the asylum grant rate that doesn’t seem likely to achieve much beyond creating further chaos...

28th November 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

The High Court has found that the Home Secretary does not have an adequate system in place for processing change of conditions application to reduce, to a reasonable and proportionate minimum, the risk of inhuman and degrading treatment caused by the “no recourse to public funds” (“NRPF”) condition. The case...

27th November 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan

Statement of changes HC 334 has been published today stating that the concession allowing Ukrainians to travel to the UK without the need to enrol their biometrics in advance will end on 18 December 2024. As of 3pm today, subject to transitional provisions, Colombians must obtain entry clearance before coming...

26th November 2024
BY Sonia Lenegan
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