UK residents will be going to the polls tomorrow (7th of May 2015) for the General Election and of course one of the hot topics as in many EU countries at the moment is immigration. Immigration policy is of course one of the hot topics in the upcoming General Election being held on 7 May 2015. Many voters worry about immigration in the UK, which has led the political parties to include detailed immigration policies within their respective manifestos.

As a UK Immigration and Human Rights lawyer, I thought it would be a good opportunity to look at an overview of the immigration policies of the Lib Dems, Labour, SNP, Green Party, Conservatives and Ukip – and hopefully dividing them into ‘the good’, ‘the bad’ and ‘the ugly’ to summaries the main policies, it may help you to make up your mind if immigration is a pivotal concern for you. Continue Reading →

Immigration Health Surcharge

The Immigration Health Surcharge is one of the key reforms within the Immigration Act 2014 which both Human Rights Solicitors and migrants must get to grips with. In addition to a new higher fee that has just kicked in, an additional NHS Immigration Health Surcharge is payable as of the 6^th April 2015 by all non-EEA migrants coming to the UK for more than six months.

The UK Government has stated that the purpose of this surcharge is to ensure that non-EEA migrants contribute to the cost of the NHS. However, given the timing it could perhaps appear as an election stunt as some of the best immigration lawyers in the UK observe – the policy began a week after Parliament is expected to dissolve and during a national election campaign… Continue Reading →

Your Protected Right to Family Life

As many of you will know, everyone has the Right to Family, and these rights are protected under the EU Convention on Human Rights. However, and to the great discomfort of many couples,  as any UK Immigration Lawyer will tell you, Right to family is right is a qualified right, and does not necessarily give the couple the right to choose where they would exercise their right to family.

Ordinarily, a British citizen is allowed by law to sponsor their foreign spouse to come to the UK on a Spouse Visa. This type of application, as many of you have seen on  previous blog post here  has recently been severely restricted, with strict income requirements for the sponsoring spouse. In effect, this has resulted in thousands of couples being separated, as they do not meet the government requirements. Continue Reading →