The Home Office yesterday published changes to the Immigration Rules intended to give effect to the Minimum Income Rule findings made by the Supreme Court in MM (Lebanon) & Others v the Secretary for the Home Department [2017] UKSC 10. The changes are set out in Statement of Changes HC 290 and here we go through them in detail. Headline changes I have set out extracts of the Statement of Changes later in this blog post for now the main headline changes are: To allow for consideration of other sources of income to meet the Minimum Income Rule Where other sources of income are relied upon the applicant, partner and any…

In the case of ZEI & Ors (Decision withdrawn – FtT Rule 17 – considerations : Palestine) [2017] UKUT 292 (IAC)  the Upper Tribunal, chaired by Mr Ockelton, has considered the application of rule 17 of the procedure rules. This rule provides that where the Home Office withdraws a decision which is under appeal, the appeal will normaly be treated as withdrawn: 17.—(1)    A party may give notice of the withdrawal of their appeal— (a)     by providing to the Tribunal a written notice of withdrawal of the appeal; or (b)     orally at a hearing, and in either case must specify the reasons for that withdrawal. (2)     The Tribunal must…

In the case of Awuah and Others (Wasted Costs Orders – HOPOs – Tribunal Powers) [2017] UKFTT 555 (IAC) the tribunal has decided that a wasted costs order — an order that a representative personally pay the costs incurred by the other side because of poor personal conduct — cannot be made against a Home Office Presenting Officer. They can however still be made against representatives for appellants. This is not what one would describe as a level playing field on which the same rules and obligations apply to all players equally. The official headnote reads: (i)            The First-tier Tribunal (“FtT”) is not empowered to make a Wasted Costs…

The nature of applications which attract a right of appeal have been greatly restricted by the Immigration Act 2014. In summary, only refused human rights applications, or applications for protection, are appealable. All other applications can be challenged by way of Judicial Review or administrative review only. What is the position of individuals who argue, however, that they were wrongly denied a right of appeal? In the case of Saqib Zia Khan v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2017] EWCA Civ 424, the Court of Appeal found that the appropriate forum to challenge these decisions is the First-Tier Tribunal. Background The procedural history of the case is complex, but…

Following a seven-day hearing in the High Court, Mr Felix Wamala, a Ugandan national, was awarded £48,000 in damages for the actions of private security guards contracted by the Home Office in seeking to remove him from the UK. This is the case of Wamala v Tascor Services Ltd [2017] EWHC 1461. The judgment is a mammoth one, weighing in at 558 paragraphs plus annexes. Mr Wamala’s claim concerned the use of force, and the threatened use of force, against him by employees of Reliance, now known as Tascor Services Ltd. Tascor is a subsidiary of Capita. As they say on their website: As part of Capita PLC, we have the…

For some reason the Home Office has just released a swathe of inspection reports into a wide range of Home Office operations. In practical terms, this makes it impossible for the press to pick out more than one or two stories from the reports and it therefore very effectively reduces scrutiny. Usually I have nothing better to do than sit and read these reports when they are hot off the press (!) but 10 in two days seems excessive even to me I cannot stir myself to read all of them. It is almost as if there is something to hide somewhere in there. Nevertheless, I am going to confine…