Consultation on Immigration Appeals

Migrationwatch Briefing Paper No 8.28 summarised some of the main features of the government’s recently published Draft (Partial) Immigration and Citizenship Bill and appended a copy of the submissions made by Migrationwatch to the Home Affairs Committee of the House of Commons. The draft is described as partial because some important topics have been omitted, with the intention of adding them later so that a complete Bill can be laid before Parliament in the next session. The government has now issued a consultation paper on proposed changes to the immigration appeals system, one of the omitted topics. For a summary of how the present system, introduced in April 2005, works, you are referred to our Briefing Paper No 8.2 (Please note that the reference in paragraph 2 of that paper to the Immigration and Nationality Department of the Home Office should now be read as a reference to the UK Border Agency, the new name of the former Department.) The content of our submissions is inevitably technical in places, but the subject is important. Asylum and immigration appeals are appeals to the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal against decisions of the UK Border Agency which are adverse to the applicant. Appeals are heard by some hundreds of immigration judges at hearing centres in London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow and other major cities. The most recent figures available show that between April 2007 and March 2008 the Tribunal disposed of over 165,000 appeals.

To see this full document go to Briefing Paper No 8.29 on Migrationwatch web site