UK Immigration News

On 29th November 2012, the UK Border Agency (UKBA) issued a warning about 'fake UK Border Agency websites and calls'. The warning advises people who want to work in the UK and students who are already studying in the UK to be aware of a number of frauds that are being carried out by criminals pretending to work for the UKBA.

Lord Bilimoria, the founder of Cobra Beer, has said that the UK's immigration policy is preventing Indian restaurants from recruiting the staff they need.

On 29th November 2012, the UK's Office of National Statistics announced that net immigration into the UK had fallen by about 25% to 183,000 in the year to March 2012, from 242,000 in the year to March 2011. Prime Minister David Cameron welcomed the news He tweeted, 'Effective immigration helps us compete in the global race'.

The UK's Labour opposition will fight the next election on a tough, anti-immigration platform, a senior Labour figure has revealed. Until now, Labour has been seen as the pro-immigration party.

Ed Balls, the shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, told a UK political website, politics.co.uk, that Labour needs to change its tune on immigration if it is to recover seats lost at the last election. 'I think people need to know that Labour recognises we didn't get everything right and will have tough controls. That's important,' he said.

The UK's chief inspector of immigration has issued a report on the UK Border Agency's management of the Tier 4 student visa system. The report is broadly positive. However, it speaks of 'a significant failing' in the UKBA's systems for dealing with notifications made under the Sponsorship Management System. A backlog of 150,000 notifications dating back to March 2009 had been allowed to accumulate. This raised concerns that 'thousands of students had retained leave to remain when they should not have done so.'

One of the UK's most senior judges has criticised solicitors in immigration cases for making meritless last-minute applications for injunctions which are unsupported by any proper arguments. He also criticised them for a failure to tell the court, as they are required to do, of any reasons why the court might want to refuse their applications. He warned them that, in future, similar failures would see them being reported to the Solicitor's Regulation Authority.