All Articles: Welfare benefits

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

The British National (Overseas) citizens immigration route opened on 31 January 2021. This article sets out the rules for the BNO visa scheme, including recent changes. The Home Office abbreviation is “BN(O)”, which we will use where it forms part of the official title of a route, but otherwise stick...

30th May 2024
BY John Vassiliou

On 18 April 2024, the Court of Appeal held in ASY & Ors v Home Office [2024] EWCA Civ 373 that damages are payable to those subjected to destitution that amounts to an imminent risk of inhuman or degrading treatment.  The Court of Appeal judgment recognised the existence of a...

8th May 2024
BY Nakita Hedges

This article explains how to make a successful change of conditions application where a person needs to lift the no recourse to public funds restriction (NRPF) from their grant of leave. This article is written for applicants as well as for the lawyers and advisors who may be assisting in...

3rd April 2024
BY Caz Hattam

The “no recourse to public funds” condition is imposed on grants of limited leave to enter or remain with the effect of prohibiting the person holding that leave from accessing certain defined public funds, set out at paragraph 6 of the immigration rules. A person who deliberately claims public funds despite such...

7th December 2023
BY Colin Yeo

The Court of Appeal has dismissed the government’s appeal in Secretary of State for Work and Pensions v AT (AIRE Centre and Independent Monitoring Authority intervening) [2023] EWCA Civ 1307, meaning that people with pre settled status under Appendix EU are able to access universal credit in circumstances where they...

9th November 2023
BY Sonia Lenegan

The Home Office has conceded the latest in an increasingly long line of cases challenging the operation of the no recourse to public funds policy. This challenge was to the refusal to lift the no recourse condition from a person with section 3C leave as a student dependant. The case...

16th October 2023
BY Sonia Lenegan

The problems faced by pre-settled status holders who cannot show a qualifying right to reside when trying to access benefits have been dragging on for several years. Notwithstanding their lawful immigration status, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) Regulations treat them as a person not in the UK and...

15th December 2022
BY Chris Benn

Too often, we all see clients who are at the mercy of the local authority housing system and who are shifted about from accommodation to accommodation with no real stability in their lives. This treatment only compounds the problems they already face following the reasons they fled their own country,...

26th August 2022
BY Colin Yeo

The High Court has declared that Home Office policy on allowing migrants to have access to public funds is unlawful for failing to take account of the best interests of children, or of a previous judgment along similar lines. The case is R (AB & ors) v Secretary of State...

27th June 2022
BY Sonia Lenegan

In R (MD and EH) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2022] EWCA Civ 336, the Court of Appeal has found that the Home Office’s non-payment of additional financial support to human trafficking victims who have children and receive asylum support was not unlawfully discriminatory. The facts The...

17th March 2022
BY Gabriel Tan

I can do no better than adopt Tom Royston’s summary of R (DK) v Revenue and Customs [2022] EWCA Civ 120: in an important decision about the rights of refugees to financial support for children, the Court of Appeal in England and Wales has agreed with their colleagues in Scotland:...

10th February 2022
BY CJ McKinney

The Supreme Court has overturned last year’s ruling that EU citizens with pre-settled status should be able to claim Universal Credit without having to jump through hoops. The case is Fratila and another v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2021] UKSC 53. Pre-settled status allows EU citizens living...

1st December 2021
BY CJ McKinney

The Court of Justice of the European Union has held that refusing Universal Credit to EU citizens with pre-settled status is justified so long as there is no risk of breaching fundamental rights under the EU Charter. The case is C-709/20 CG v Department for Communities in Northern Ireland. This...

16th July 2021
BY Bilaal Shabbir

The Court of Session in Scotland and the High Court in England and Wales have both ruled that newly recognised refugees have a right to claim backdated child tax credit. The cases are Adnan, Petitioners [2021] CSOH 63 and R (DK) v Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2021] EWHC 1845...

7th July 2021
BY Bilaal Shabbir

The High Court has declared that an anomaly in the benefits system which disadvantages victims of trafficking who receive asylum support is discriminatory and in breach of Article 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Unusually, the Secretary of State confessed to the court that she was not sure...

2nd June 2021
BY Alex Schymyck

Rules restricting migrants’ access to benefits are back in the spotlight following a new High Court decision, which found that aspects of the “no recourse to public funds” (NRPF) scheme fail to protect the rights of children. The case of ST (a child, by his Litigation Friend VW) & VW...

4th May 2021
BY Karma Hickman

The derivative right to reside as a primary carer of a child in education is largely a creation of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU): see Teixeira v Lambeth LBC (C-480/08) and Ibrahim v Secretary of State for the Home Department (C-310/08). The right is ultimately based...

6th January 2021
BY Desmond Rutledge

The Court of Appeal has handed down a ruling that should, if not successfully appealed, make it easier for millions of EU citizens with pre-settled status to claim benefits. The case is Fratila and Tanase v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2020] EWCA Civ 1741. Alex explores the...

18th December 2020
BY CJ McKinney

In a bid to slow the surge in COVID-19 cases, Prime Minister Boris Johnson last night set out new restrictions in England which range from the wearing of masks by shop workers to limits on the number of people attending weddings. These measures come hard on the heels of a...

23rd September 2020
BY Cryton Chikoko

It was the worst of times; it was the worst of times. As a result of the Home Office gridlock caused by the coronavirus pandemic, EU citizens seeking to apply for post-Brexit immigration status under the EU Settlement Scheme have been disadvantaged in various ways, including longer processing times. The...

28th July 2020
BY Alex Piletska

The appellant in the case of Konevod v Secretary of State for Work And Pensions [2020] EWCA Civ 809 moved to Cyprus in 2014 to become a carer for a friend, Ms Ozturk. Both Mr Konevod and Ms Ozturk had lived and worked in the UK, qualifying for state pensions...

7th July 2020
BY CJ McKinney

No recourse to public funds (‘NRPF’) is a condition imposed on the majority of UK visa holders preventing them from claiming benefits. In R (W, A Child By His Litigation Friend J) v Secretary of State for the Home Department & Anor [2020] EWHC 1299, the High Court found the...

27th May 2020
BY John Vassiliou

The High Court has rejected an argument that the regulations making it difficult for Europeans with pre-settled status to access most public funds are discriminatory on the ground of nationality. The case is Fratila and Tanase v SSWP [2020] EWHC 998 (Admin). Mr Justice Swift found that although the Social...

30th April 2020
BY Alex Piletska

An immigration detainee who has indefinite leave to remain must apply to their local council for housing benefit rather than for a bail address or asylum support provided by the Home Office. R (AT (Guinea))) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2019] EWHC 2709 (Admin) is about the...

31st October 2019
BY Alex Schymyck

In Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs v HD (CHB) (Second interim decision) [2018] UKUT 148 (AAC), the Upper Tribunal decided to make a reference to the Court of Justice of the European Union. The question is whether an EU national who was self-employed before pregnancy and childbirth can rely on...

22nd May 2018
BY Desmond Rutledge

When a self-employed EU citizen falls on hard times in another member state and stops working, do they retain their status as a worker? Since 2010, English courts have said they do not. In a case with wide implications for residence and social security rights, the Court of Justice of...

22nd December 2017
BY Thomas Beamont

LO v SSWP (IS) [2017] UKUT 440 (AAC) involved the overlap between EU law, family law and welfare benefits, focusing particularly on the role of proportionality. All this is academic to LO, who just wanted her income support. Despite compelling personal circumstances, there was no basis on which the tribunal could...

4th December 2017
BY Anjana Daniel

Where there is a “difference in views” between two European Union member states about which is required to pay a benefit to a claimant, EU law requires the state in which the claimant resides to make interim payments until the dispute is resolved. Secretary of State for Work and Pensions v...

29th November 2017
BY John Vassiliou

In R (HC) v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2017] UKSC 73 the Supreme Court decided that Zambrano carers are not eligible for non-contributory benefits which have a “right to reside” test. The benefits affected by the decision are income support, child benefit, child tax credits, and housing...

17th November 2017
BY Paul Erdunast

Newcomers to the UK, whether they have immigration status or not, face formidable obstacles in accessing services such as housing or social security. This is a look at some common scenarios and how foreign nationals and their advisers deal with them. They are based on real client cases. Scenario one:...

30th October 2017
BY John Murphy

In AMS v SSWP (PC) (final decision) [2017] UKUT 381 (AAC), Upper Tribunal Judge Ward dismissed a Dutch widow’s appeal against the refusal of her claim for state pension credit on the basis that she had no right to reside in the UK. Although a disappointing result for Mrs AMS,...

17th October 2017
BY nathgbikpi

The claimant in SSWP v NZ (ESA) [2017] UKUT 0360 (AAC) is a Polish national who worked in a chip shop. On 4 September 2017, the Upper Tribunal released a third interim decision in the case, relating to a very specific issue: had the UK derogated from Article 17 of...

3rd October 2017
BY nathgbikpi

In the case of Hrabkova v Secretary of State for Work and Pension [2017] EWCA Civ 794, the Court of Appeal confirmed once again that self-employed individuals do not have the same rights as workers under EU law. The specific question in this case was whether a person with a...

2nd July 2017
BY Nath Gbikpi

Desmond Rutledge considers the Advocate General’s Opinion (C-308/14) on the EU Commission’s action against the United Kingdom’s use of the right to reside test. This post was originally published on the Garden Court Chambers Blog. The origins of the Commission’s action against the UK In European Commission v United Kingdom...

22nd October 2015
BY Desmond Rutledge

Desmond Rutledge examines the recent decision in Alimanovic (C-67/14) which holds that it is lawful for a Member State to restrict the period a former worker from another Member State can access benefits upon becoming involuntarily unemployed based on Dano (C-333/12). This post was originally published on the Garden Court...

21st October 2015
BY Desmond Rutledge

In Blakesley v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions [2015] EWCA Civ 141 the Court of Appeal considered whether the UK Government is in breach of its international obligations towards refugees because of the lack of any provision to make back-payments of welfare benefits to those asylum seekers who,...

12th March 2015
BY Desmond Rutledge

In January 2014, the Government introduced a number of measures aimed at restricting EEA migrants’ access to income-based JSA. A key change was the introduction of a statutory presumption that entitlement to income-based JSA (‘JSA(IB)’) would be limited to a period of three months (or six months for EEA nationals...

24th February 2015
BY Desmond Rutledge

New Social Security Advisory Committee Report voices concerns On 20 November 2014, the Social Security Advisory Committee (SSAC) published its Report on the regulations which remove entitlement to Housing Benefit for certain categories of European Economic Area (EEA) jobseekers. The Committee expresses a number of concerns about the impact of...

25th November 2014
BY Desmond Rutledge

When the Grand Chamber handed down its judgment in Dano v Jobcenter Leipzig (C-333/13) on 11 November 2014, it was the subject of much media attention: Germany can deny benefits to jobless EU migrants, court rules (The Guardian), Landmark ECJ ruling boosts David Cameron’s bid to clamp down on EU...

19th November 2014
BY Desmond Rutledge
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