After being trailed on breakfast TV, the new rules on students were eventually more formally announced last week. It seems the education sector is in for a double whammy. The […]
UKBA have changed their removals policy, and not in a nice way. The announcement letter to stakeholders is available here and does not really tell half the story. In essence, the […]
In an unusually dramatic move, the Presenting Officer in the recent case of KB (para: 320(7A): “false representations”) Albania [2009] UKAIT 00043 served a section 40 notice on a witness […]
No time for a proper post on this new case from the tribunal, NA & Others (Tier 1 Post-Study Work-funds) [2009] UKAIT 00025, so I’ll just paste in the headnote, […]
Wending my way north on the train at an ungodly hour this morning, I found my reserved seat was opposite a fellow immigration lawyer I know from times past. We […]
The determination concerns the award of a qualification for the purposes of Tier 1: Post Study Work rather than the bigger issue of the silly maintenance requirements. Senior Immigration Judge […]
The Home Office have today announced some changes to the Points Based System for Tier 4 students. In summary, the main changes are: 1. Transitional arrangements on maintenance are extended […]
There are reports that the Home Office just conceded a judicial review against the maintenance requirements under the Points Based System (PBS). This could be a very important development, and […]
The Home Office recently increased the minimum age for both spouses to 21 if a foreign spouse is to enter the UK on a spouse visa. The same requirements apply […]
The flunky that writes the Home Office press releases really needs to tone it down and get a grip. One of the latest batches of press releases is entitled ‘Tough […]
News from ILPA is that the recent trend towards rejecting in-country applications to switch to become unmarried partners is a temporary blip. A strict reading of immigration rule 295D(i) shows […]
UKBA have announced a limited concession to the rise in the visa age to 21 for spouses and partners. The concession is simply that the rule will not be applied […]
Free Movement may be cursed. Almost as soon as I blogged about DP3/96 it was scrapped, and now the same has happened to DP5/96. Phil Woolas has withdrawn DP5/96 as […]
I want briefly to acknowledge the passing of the Working Holiday Maker scheme today. It was one of the last vestiges of the favourable treatment of Commonwealth countries and their […]
UPDATE: the seven year children rule has been scrapped. Read more here. — There are two immigration rules that can be used to acquire settlement (Indefinite Leave to Remain, or […]
Well, this is a bit of a surprise. “Cameron, David” has lodged an Early Day Motion opposing the latest change in the immigration rules (both latest changes: typically, the first set […]
The Home Office has announced that major changes to the student rules will apply from March 2009. Allegedly, students are being brought within the ‘points based scheme‘. However, anyone reading […]
Only yesterday I was telling someone there is no timescale for the Home Office to introduce this controversial measure, but today it has been announced it will take effect from […]
The Tribunal have just issued a determination holding that proxy marriages in Brazil must be recognised in English law. The case is called CB (Validity of marriage: proxy marriage) Brazil [2008] […]
[UPDATE: case overturned by Supreme Court] In a case called AM (Ethiopia) & Ors v Entry Clearance Officer [2008] EWCA Civ 1082 the Court of Appeal has just upheld the Asylum and […]
The new Immigration Minister, Phil Woolas, yesterday announced the announcement of new rules for visitors. Spot the deliberate tautology? The Home Office seems to have improved the amount of warning […]
It sounds from various internet forums as if the British High Commission at Canberra is getting tough on applicants for Tier 1. Where applications have been submitted that include evidence […]
Favourite shortage occupation: meteorologists It’s official: we don’t have enough home-grown talent in the weather forecasting department and need to import skilled weatherpersons from abroad. In order to tell us that […]
News from the front line is that Entry Clearance Officers (ECOs) are overturning refusals under immigration rule 320(7B) that were made before the string of concessions was announced. Just ask […]
One of the annoyingly frequent changes to the immigration rules has just been issued and can be found here. These sometimes come out as often as fortnightly, and I can […]
Thanks for those who posted comments pointing the way to updated guidance to visa officers on the issue of contriving to frustrate immigration rules. The guidance is here and reads […]
Following on from the parliamentary debate last week, the Entry Clearance Guidance (ECG, until recently rather quaintly called the Diplomatic Service Instructions – I always thought the idea visa officers were diplomatic […]
Some great news on the re-entry ban saga. There was an unusually good debate in the Commons last night, when several MPs managed to put the screws on Liam Byrne, […]
The Home Office has managed to change the online guidance on DP3/96 surprisingly rapidly and these are now available to read. See chapter 53, section 53.3 of the Enforcement Instructions […]
The Government has lost yet again. I’m beginning to feel embarrassed for them. These repeated legal defeats smack of a basic failure to comprehend the idea of rule of law. That’s OK […]
In terms of scraping the bottom of the barrel, this is beaten only by the withdrawal of the non-removal policy for over 65s. Why oh why would they bother? Since […]
An interesting case is circulating amongst immigration lawyers at the moment but has not been officially reported. The Asylum and Immigration Tribunal reporting process is somewhat opaque, to put it […]
Liam Byrne, the Immigration Minister, has written to the Immigration Law Practitioners Association (ILPA) with some further clarification on the no return amendment to paragraph 320 of the immigration rules […]
The Home Office and UK Visas have published guidance on their website about how their decision-makers should apply the re-entry ban and the concession that was announced. Unfortunately, they appear […]
In response to a comment left on my last post, I should make it clear that the concession as it stands in Hansard only applies to people currently in the […]
Immigration lawyers have been shocked by Government proposals to introduce from 1 April 2008 a re-entry ban on immigrants who have previously breached UK immigration laws. The ban was debated […]
Permission was granted today by Mr Justice Sullivan in a judicial review of the decision to retrospectively change the immigration rules on the qualifying criteria for settlement under the Highly […]
I said some time ago that I would do a post on this subject and here it is… The maintenance requirement is one of the key tests in the immigration rules, and it […]
In the fourth quarter of 2006, the most recent statistics available on asylum applications, 730 unaccompanied children applied for asylum in the United Kingdom. The total number of child asylum […]
On 1 May 2007 a new immigration category was created, called the International Graduates Scheme. This supersedes and replaces the previous Science and Engineering Graduates Scheme, affectionately known as SEGS. […]
