UK Immigration News

Future Conservative Party parliamentary candidates want to see overseas students removed from the UK's migration statistics, according to a newly released poll. The poll, conducted by the Higher Education Policy Institute, an Oxford-based think tank, also revealed that the Tory candidates would like to see the number of international students at UK universities increase.

The UK's Office for National Statistics has released its latest mid-year population estimate which suggests that the UK population exceeded 64 million for the first time in mid-2013.

The UK's Home Secretary, Theresa May, has announced a series of reforms to the UK's visa regime to make it easier for Chinese nationals to come to the UK.

Over the last few years there have been problems in the UK's relations with China; particularly so since the meeting between UK Prime Minister David Cameron and the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists in May 2012.

Emma Watson, who played Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter films, is under investigation by UK immigration over allegations that she illegally employed a foreign housekeeper with no work visa at her London home.

Various UK news sources have claimed that Ms Watson first employed the woman when she was in the US in February 2013 while studying at Brown University, a prestigious 'Ivy League' university in Rhode Island.

The UK's chief inspector of immigration, John Vine, has warned that there is evidence that many foreign nationals are gaining UK residence visas by the use of proxy marriage certificates. In certain countries a marriage can take place without one of the parties to the marriage being present (a proxy marriage).

Mr Vine warns that the Home Office is not taking sufficient steps to check on 'proxy marriage' certificates from countries such as Nigeria, Ghana and Brazil. His report says that fraudulent visa applications may be made using proxy marriage certificates.

A junior minister in the UK government has said that the UK will not turn back the clock on its reforms to the immigration system, despite the fact that it would be good for the economy.

Nicky Morgan, a junior minister in the Treasury and the minister for women, has told senior figures from the City of London that there were 'political sensitivities' around immigration which made it impossible for the government to change its policy on cutting net immigration to the UK.