Tip of the Day: Undocumented Parents Having A British Citizen Child In The UK

Posted on December 9, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard 5

Home Office Policy Guidance, IDI, Appendix FM Section 1.0b Family Life (as a Partner or Parent) and Private Life: 10-Year Routes, August 2015, currently summarises at Paragraph 3.5:

The 10–year parent route provides a basis on which leave to remain can be granted to a parent who has responsibility for or access to their child following the breakdown of their relationship with the child’s other parent.

This route is for single parents who:

have sole parental responsibility for their child; or
are the parent with whom the child normally lives, rather than the child’s other parent (who is British or settled); or
do not live with the child (who instead lives with a British or settled parent or carer), but they have direct access in person to the child, as agreed with the parent or carer with whom the child normally lives, or as ordered by a court in the UK.

The parent route is therefore not for couples with a child together who are in a genuine and subsisting relationship. An applicant can only apply for the parent route if they are not eligible to apply for the partner route.

So what can parents with an irregular immigration status do where they have a child born in the UK who is a British citizen?

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Immigration Judge’s Unfair Conduct: Why has the Upper Tribunal withheld the detail of that conduct in Elayi?

Posted on November 23, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard 2

Appellants who appear before Immigration Judges are human beings: their humanness does not cease the minute they enter the Tribunal venue building so as to be picked up again upon leaving the venue.

Appellants need to be treated with dignity, fairness and respect: at all times during proceedings and by ALL persons present.

An Immigration Judge can be stated to have a considerable degree of power over an Appellant’s life. This is because some of the appeals they consider involve life and limb, in particular claims from Appellants seeking protection as well as claims which involve issues of family life separation matters where young children are involved. With that knowledge and having at their grip the power to allow or dismiss an appeal, it surely does not take much for an Immigration Judge to ensure that during proceedings a measure of fairness is accorded to an Appellant at all times.

Although the fresh decision in Elayi (fair hearing – appearance) [2016] UKUT 508 (IAC) is very much welcome in seeking to reiterate the obvious, “Justice must not only be done but must manifestly be seen to be done”, there are issues as set out below regarding the deficiencies within that judgment.

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Public Interest Considerations :Court of Appeal Gives Guidance On Concept Of “Precariousness”

Posted on August 5, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard Reply

In Rhuppiah v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2016] EWCA Civ 803, the Court of Appeal sought to deal with several matters at once as regards issues of interpretation of Sections 117A to 117D in Part 5A of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 (as inserted by the Immigration Act 2014). What was in issue therefore was the public interest question – ie the question whether an interference with a person’s right to respect for private and family life is justified under Article 8(2) of the ECHR.

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7 Year Children Rule: Court of Appeal Clarifies the Correct Approach to the Reasonableness Test

Posted on July 8, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard 2

It has taken all of 3years and 7months for there to be clarification from the higher Courts as regards the correct approach to the reasonableness test in Paragraph 276ADE(1)(iv) of the Immigration Rules. The Court of Appeal’s judgment on the issue in MA (Pakistan) & Ors, R (on the application of) v Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) & Anor [2016] EWCA Civ 705, makes very interesting reading.

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Court of Appeal’s Further Guidance On The Correct Approach To Deportation Appeals

Posted on July 2, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard 1

In addition to noting that the Court of Appeal has provided yet further guidance in relation to deportation appeals in NA (Pakistan) v Secretary of State for the Home Department & Ors [2016] EWCA Civ 662, legal practitioners need to brace themselves for yet further wordplay in relation to newly introduced deportation lingo. We are now familiar with and have grown fairly comfortable with regularly used terms such as, “ a free standing Article 8 analysis” and “ through the lens of the immigration rules”. The Court of Appeal in NA (Pakistan) has gone further; as noted at paragraph 14 of their judgement, when considering the Immigration Rules on deportation, foreign criminals are divided into two categories: those with sentences of between one and four years’ imprisonment and those sentenced to four years or more. The Court of Appeal then decided for the sake of “simplicity”, that the first category shall be referred to as ‘medium offenders’ and the second category as ‘serious offenders’.

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Court of Appeal Clarifies Correct Approach in Adult Children Article 8 Cases

Posted on June 28, 2016 by alicemuzira Standard 2

The Court of Appeal has recently, in the case of PT (Sri Lanka) v Entry Clearance Officer, Chennai [2016] EWCA Civ 612, sought to set out the law as to the circumstances in which an adult child can be regarded as enjoying family life with his parents and/or siblings.

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