Issue 136 - 27th April 2009

Monday 27 April 2009

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News

The UKBA has announced new criteria which it will use to consider applications from former members of the Brigade of Gurkhas to settle in the UK.

In response, campaigners for these former Gurkha soldiers seeking to retire in Britain have accused the Government of treachery, saying that the new guidelines would bar most of them from settling. see

France's immigration minister has stated that a vast 'squat' in Calais, currently home to migrants seeking to reach Britain, will be closed by the end of the year and has urged Britain to do more to solve the problem.

Cases

Three judgements from Mr Ockelton (sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge), all dated 23 April 2009: in R (Omondi) v SSHD [2009] EWHC 827 (Admin) he held - in a case where a Kenyan citizen had had leave to enter / remain for more than one year in the past, had overstayed and then made an asylum claim which on refusal was certified under 2002 Act, s. 94(2),(3)&(4)(ee) (thus prohibiting an in-country appeal under 2002 Act, s. 82) - that the right of appeal under 2002 Act, s.83 arises only in circumstances where the appellant has made an asylum claim which has been refused, and has been granted periods of leave exceeding one year in aggregate since the decision to refuse asylum.

In R (Polanco) v SSHD [2009] EWHC 826 (Admin) he ordered, by way of interim relief, the claimant's release from detention where the claimant had already been detained for 33 months and faced the prospect of lengthy continuing detention because his appeal to the Court of Appeal, against the determination of the AIT in OP (EEA; permanent right of residence) Colombia [2008] UKAIT 00074 (see Immigration law bulletin, issue 111), would likely either be referred itself to the ECJ or stayed until the result of the reference to the ECJ in Secretary of State for Work and Pensions v Taous Lassal [2009] EWCA Civ 157 is known.

In R (Majera) v SSHD [2009] EWHC 825 (Admin) he quashed the SSHD's refusal to treat representations as a fresh claim because of the SSHD's failure to take adequate account of independent evidence that the claimant had been treated as having been born some three years later (such as to have been a minor when a decision to deport was made) than held to be the case by the SSHD and an immigration judge. see

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