27 July 2016
Brexit and British Citizens living in other Member States
When the British electorate voted in the referendum on 23 June whether to stay in or leave the European Union few of us in the legal profession thought we would need to become experts on a rather arcane provision of the Treaty on European Union (Article 50) about the mechanisms which need to be applied to the departure of a Member State from the EU. However, now this is the case and there is much rumination about the constitutional requirements for both the UK to trigger the departure procedure and the EU institutions to negotiate that event.
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.
8 July 2016
Biometric Residence Permits and National Insurance numbers
The Home Office is currently rolling out the issuance of National Insurance (NI) numbers for all applicants applying to enter the UK under the Tier 2 General, Minister of Religion or Sportsperson categories. Once an application under these categories has been submitted overseas, this triggers an application to the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) for an NI number to be issued. This NI number is then included on the Biometric Residence Permit (BRP). At least that is what is supposed to happen.
17 June 2016
The challenges in managing international assignments for UK based employees – where to next?
Whilst discussions regarding the EU Referendum in the UK reach a crescendo, perhaps the greatest challenge and source of frustration that lies ahead is one that will not be resolved by 24th June – uncertainty. Irrespective of the outcome of the vote, there will be no definitive solution or clear guidelines as to what changes to the existing regulations will be implemented and more broadly how the landscape of UK immigration will be altered in the months and years to come. In this blog, we address what may be considered as permissible activities for a short-term trip under a business visa and the key factors that should be taken into account when sending EU or non-EU national employees based in the UK on long-term global assignments.
2 June 2016
Immigration Act 2016 - introducing changes to criminal sanctions for employers
Following our blog on 5th May 2016 regarding the provisions of the Immigration Bill, the Immigration Act 2016 (“the Act”) has now received Royal Assent and passed into law on 12 May 2016. Most significantly for immigration Sponsors, provisions relating to illegal working come into effect on 12 July 2016 and these include: