UK Immigration News

John Vine, the UK's Independent Chief Inspector of Borders and Immigration, has agreed to renew his contract. Mr Vine was first appointed in 2008 and has been credited by MPs with exposing many failings of the UK's former immigration authority, the UK Border Agency (UKBA) which was abolished in March 2013.

The UK's Business Secretary, Vince Cable, has told an international educational conference that the inclusion of international students in the UK's immigration statistics and negative anti-immigration remarks in the UK has led to bad publicity in India. In recent years more Indian students have decided to study in countries other than the UK.

Humza Yousaf, the Scottish government's external affairs minister, has criticised the UK government for its immigration policy which, he says, is damaging the Scottish economy. Mr Yousaf said that Scottish society opposed UK immigration policy. He said 'There's no doubt that the UK government's restrictive immigration policies are damaging Scotland's economy….Immigration is one of the only policy issues that I can think of that unites Scottish business, the trade unions, politicians, the universities because they're all feeling the impact of restrictive immigration policies'.

The European Commission (EC) announced on Thursday 30th May 2013 that it intends to sue the UK government in the European Court of Justice over alleged discrimination against immigrants from the EU in the UK's benefits system. The EC argues that the UK's 'right to reside' test, which EU citizens living in the UK must pass in order to qualify for benefits, is discriminatory because it treats EU citizens differently from UK citizens, something which is not allowed under European law.

The latest figures show that there has been a significant drop in the net level of immigration into the UK. The net immigration figure is reached by calculating the number of immigrants over a given period and then subtracting the number of people leaving the country permanently. In the year to September 2012, 500,000 people immigrated and 347,000 left so the net immigration figure was 153,000. This is 89,000 lower than the 242,000 figure for the year to September 2011; 242,000.

The British Dental Association has joined the Royal College of GPs in expressing concern about the UK government's proposed immigration reforms.