Blog
Kingsley Napley’s Medical Negligence Team ‘walks together’ with the Dame Vera Lynn Children’s Charity
Sharon Burkill
18 January 2017
Theresa May signals an end to free movement and leaves EU citizens here and British citizens abroad in limbo
Theresa May’s eagerly anticipated speech on the UK’s starting point for negotiations on Brexit, has sketched a very broad outline of her intentions with respect to immigration from the EU moving forward. However when you get up close there is little new detail and her comments have, arguably, raised more questions than they have answered.
14 December 2016
Local authorities roll out new streamlined services for British citizenship and Permanent Residence applications
In recent months the Home Office, in partnership with local authorities, has rolled out a number of new initiatives for those making British citizenship applications and for EEA nationals applying for documents certifying they have acquired Permanent Residence under EU law. These new services offer a number of benefits for applicants, not least the ability to retain an original passport whilst an application is being processed but also speeding up the processing time. Set out in this blog is a brief overview of these new services and the benefits they provide.
30 November 2016
Would the UK consider Donald Trump to be of ‘good character’?
Eager to ingratiate themselves with the new President-elect, the UK Government is apparently considering inviting Donald Trump on a state visit in 2017. This will be no ordinary visit, Donald Trump having the dubious honour of being the first sitting President who MPs have actually debated banning from the UK following a petition calling for that which attracted just shy of 600,000 signatures. At the time of the petition, Theresa May, then Home Secretary, publicly noted her disagreement with Trump’s call for a ban on all Muslims entering the United States and released a statement that noted ‘we will continue to speak out against comments which have the potential to divide our communities regardless of who makes them. We reject any attempts to create division and marginalisation amongst those we endeavour to protect’. While the statement did not refer directly to Donald Trump, the message was taken to be a veiled comment on his policy proposal and the petition.
Despite some stinging remarks about then-candidate Trump, the debate was more for show than with the intention of leading to any actual restrictions on his entry to the UK and the President Elect, who has a number of business interests in the UK, has since visited.
That said, with a looming state visit, I thought it would be worth considering whether Donald Trump could fall foul of any of the ‘good character’ requirements that apply to British nationality applications.
21 November 2016
Immigration update - Further expansion of UK Registered Traveller Service
The Home Office has announced the expansion of the UK Registered Traveller Service to applicants from 16 new countries, with effect from today. Business travellers and frequent visitors will be able to benefit from faster entry to the UK as the Government’s Registered Traveller Service is expanded. Membership will now also be open to passengers from Argentina, Belize, Brazil, Brunei, Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Israel, Malaysia, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay and Uruguay, subject to meeting the membership criteria.
13 July 2016
Reflections on the impact of the UK’s recent and future hostile migration environment
At a faster pace than any had imagined, we are today welcoming a new Prime Minister. A Prime Minister who made a forceful case for significantly cutting immigration when given a platform at last year’s party conference. A Prime Minister who has headed up the department which oversees the design and implementation of immigration policy in the UK over the last six years. A Prime Minister who will need to grapple with, amongst other issues, the position of current and future European migrants to the UK in any upcoming negotiations on the implementation of a ‘Brexit’. It seems prudent, therefore, to reflect on her last six years at the Home Office and consider what her department’s past actions and particularly that speech at last year’s party conference may portend for us who work in immigration or who avail ourselves of the immigration system moving forward.
Many of the developments over the last six years can be seen in the context of a Government striving to meet the arbitrary target of reducing immigration to the tens of thousands. In this quest, no immigration category has been left untouched.