Until recently, self-employed Turkish businesspersons who were in the UK under the Ankara Agreement could get indefinite leave to remain after four years. Then two cases established that the Secretary of State was entitled to change the rules on settlement while still complying with that agreement: see the Upper Tribunal case of R (Aydogdu) v Secretary of State for the Home Department (Ankara Agreement – family members – settlement) [2017] UKUT 167 (IAC) and the Scottish case Bektas Alagoz [2017] CSOH 27.

The rules were duly changed with effect from 16 March 2018, as Nath explains in this post: No more settlement for Turkish businesspeople under the Ankara Agreement. Right now, the most that applicants for indefinite leave to remain after that date can get is a further period of three years’ leave.

The good news is that the Home Office has promised to introduce a new route to settlement for “Turkish ECAA business persons”. We now know that this is due “in the latter half of 2018”, thanks to a parliamentary question tabled by Caroline Lucas MP.

There was no answer to the related question of transitional arrangements for people who have been in the UK for several years already and face having to restart the clock on their ILR applications, rather than having their time already in Britain counted towards the residence requirement under this new route. The Home Office says simply that “while the requirements of such a category are to be determined, this will be a charged route in line with others who are seeking to settle in the UK”.

We’ll keep an eye out for developments with this and update this post when we hear more.

Update as promised: the new settlement rules for Turkish workers were introduced in June 2018 with the addition of Appendix ECAA to the Immigration Rules.