Areas Across UK Would Have Suffered Population Decline Without Immigrants
Dozens of local communities across England and Wales would have suffered “spiraling” population decline without immigration, a new report shows.
Research by think tank Global Future found that without the arrival of migrants between 2001 and 2016, public services in 57 local authorities would have been starved of staff and funds due to a shrinking population, sending the communities into decline.
Nine local areas, including Southampton, Barking, Dagenham and Slough, would have suffered at least 5 per cent population decline without immigrants, while 130 local authorities would have suffered a working-age population decline, according to the report.
A shrinking, ageing population hurts public services and local employers, encouraging more people to leave and creating a “vicious cycle” which has led to decline in many parts of the world, such as small towns and cities across America’s Rust Belt, it said.
The report’s author, Fergus Peace, said preventing population decline was one of the key benefits of immigration, but that it was “hardly recognised” in public debate.
Read more: May Bulman, Independent, https://is.gd/jFK83j
'White Death' in Argentina: The Hunger of Poverty Feeds Tuberculosis
["White Death" illness, closely linked to malnutrition and poor housing, have been on the rise since the turn of the decade as Latin America's third largest economy has been battered by repeat recessions and inflation.]
In a poor Buenos Aires suburb, Cristian Molina's jeans and denim jacket hide his unhealthily slight frame, his legacy from years of a poor diet that left him susceptible to the tuberculosis infection he contracted earlier this year, a disease of poverty that is making a comeback in Argentina.
Molina, 26, lives in the shantytown of Lujan near the wealthy capital with his parents, six siblings and four nephews. Doctors think one brother contracted the disease in prison and then spread it around the family when he returned home.
Cases of the "white death" illness, closely linked to malnutrition and poor housing, have been on the rise since the turn of the decade as Latin America's third largest economy has been battered by repeat recessions and inflation.
Currently, fast-rising prices and recession are driving more people below the poverty line and stoking homelessness and hunger. The poverty rate stood at above 35% in the first half of the year, hurting Argentine President Mauricio Macri, who is expected to lose the general elections this Sunday.
"Tuberculosis is the collateral damage of poverty," said Laura Lagrutta, an Argentine respiratory specialist focused on treating children with the disease. According to the latest figures from the World Health Organization, there were 10,320 reports of new and relapsed TB cases in Argentina last year. The number of cases, which had dropped steadily since the 1980s, started to rise again after around 2010. Tuberculosis kills 5,000 people every day globally and is one of the world's biggest killers.
Read more: Reuters, https://is.gd/qHkvoJ
Separated Migrant Children Given Better Access to Legal Aid
Immigration matters for separated migrant children brought into scope of legal aid.
Legislation will increase access to justice for vulnerable group
Move welcomed by children’s charities
Vulnerable migrant children who have been separated from their parents will get quicker and simpler access to legal aid, after new government legislation came into force today (25 October 2019).
The Legal Aid for Separated Children Order 2019 will bring non-asylum immigration and citizenship matters into the scope of legal aid for under 18s who are not in the care of a parent, guardian or legal authority.
Previously, vulnerable children making such applications to remain in the UK could only apply for legal aid through the Exceptional Case Funding (ECF) scheme.
Justice Minister Wendy Morton MP said: “This is a positive step to make sure we are offering the right support and protection to some of the most vulnerable in our society. These changes will mean migrant children who have been separated from their carers can access the vital legal support they need faster and more easily.”
The Ministry of Justice has worked with The Children’s Society and other children’s charities on the amendment and will continue to do so as it comes into force.
Mark Russell, CEO the Children’s Society, said: “We are delighted the government has acted on their promise to ensure separated and unaccompanied children can resolve immigration issues and secure their citizenship, without the stress of applying for exceptional case funding, or trying to navigate complex human rights law all alone. We look forward to working closely with the Ministry of Justice to ensure that affected children and the professionals supporting them know about this vital change.”
The amendment is in addition to publication of the department’s Legal Support Action Plan earlier this year. This committed to improving the Exceptional Case Funding scheme, along with a series of pilots to test the most effective forms of early legal support.
Reviews have also begun into the legal aid means test to ensure accessibility into the future, along with the entire criminal legal aid system through the Criminal Legal Aid Review.
Published 25 October 2019, Ministry of Justice and Legal Aid Agency
Source : Gov UK, https://is.gd/oC3yYV
Legal Prospects Available for Windrush Clients With Children Born Outside The UK
Have you been granted settled status in the UK under the Windrush Scheme, or are you the child of someone who has? Have you been separated from children, a partner, or dependent relatives as the result of settling in the UK under the Windrush Scheme? Did you have children abroad at a time when the Home Office should have recognised your lawful immigration status in the UK?
If any of the above questions relate to your circumstances, we may be able to help.
On 16 October 2019, we issued a challenge in the High Court to the Secretary of State for the Home Department for refusing to consider our client’s application for her family to join her in the UK under the Windrush Scheme. We believe that the Home Office is acting unlawfully in requiring people to separate from their family members in order to take up a grant of leave under the scheme. We also believe that family members of people who have been granted status under the Windrush scheme should have access to the benefits of the scheme including fee-free applications and leave to enter and remain in the UK.
The Home Office has accepted its historic failure to properly recognise and record the lawful immigration status of members of the Windrush generation. It has said it wants to right the wrongs that it committed. The scheme that the Home Office has designed to regularise people’s immigration status, only extends to children of people who are granted status in very limited circumstances. Crucially, this does not include children who were born outside the UK if they did not come to the UK before they were 18 years old. We have argued that this is a breach of the rights to private and family life of the person granted status under the scheme, and any family members from whom they have been forcibly separated.
The scheme also applies a strict reading of nationality law, and the Home Office has refused countless applications for British citizenship from people who were granted settled status under the scheme. This strict reading of nationality law fails to take into account the fact that people lawfully settled in the UK may not have applied for British citizenship because they did not realise that this was possible, and because their lawful status was never properly recorded or communicated to them.
If your lawful settled status was recognised under Windrush, but your application for citizenship was refused, we may also be able to help. Given the Home Office’s position, it will now fall to the Courts to decide whether the Home Office is acting lawfully in the circumstances. If you have faced similar problems, we want to hear from you. Please get in touch with public law caseworker Jeremy Bloom by email to jeremyb@duncanlewis.com or by phone on 0203 114 1260.
Legal aid (public funding) is available subject to your financial situation, and the merits of your case.
Duncan Lewis: (23 October 2019)https://is.gd/Dxg4GV
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Children’s Seven Year Rule – Rules Against Home Office Attempt to Deport
Deport Their Parents
E A and Others (Anonymity Direction Made) v Home Office
1. The first appellant is a citizen of Nigeria who entered the UK on 15 September 2007 with leave to enter as a student. The second appellant, his wife, entered the UK on 24 August 2011 with their two children. The oldest child was three years old and the youngest was two years old on arrival in the UK.
2. On 22 February 2018 the appellants applied for leave to remain on human rights grounds. At the date of the application both children had lived in the UK for a continuous period of six years and six months. The respondent refused the application in a decision dated 06 July 2018 on the ground that the appellants did not satisfy the family and private life requirements contained in the immigration rules and there were no other exceptional circumstances to justify a grant of leave to remain on human rights grounds.
3. First-tier Tribunal Judge N.M.K. Lawrence ("the judge") dismissed the appeal in a decision promulgated on 03 April 2019. At the date of the hearing on 15 March 2019 the oldest child was 11 years old and the youngest child was 10 years old. By that time the children had been resident in the UK for a continuous period of around seven years and seven months. The judge concluded that none of the appellants met the private or family life requirements of the immigration rules. In assessing whether the first and second appellants met the requirements of section 117B(6) of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 ("the NIAA 2002") the judge accepted that both children were 'qualifying children' because they had been continuously resident for a period of at least seven years. There was no dispute that the first and second appellants had a genuine and subsisting parental relationship with the children. However, the judge concluded that it would be reasonable to expect the children to leave the UK with their parents.
4. The appellants appealed the First-tier Tribunal decision on the following grounds:
- Failure to make clear findings relating to best interests of the children
Despite citing numerous cases on the issue, the judge failed to make any clear findings as to where the best interests of the two children lay. Having failed to make any clear findings relating to the best interests of the children the judge lacked a proper starting point for consideration of the separate question of whether it was reasonable to expect the children to leave the UK for the purpose of section 117B(6) NIAA 2002.
- Confused and contradictory findings relating to the 'reasonableness' test
The judge made confused and contradictory findings before concluding that it would be reasonable to expect the children to leave the UK. At [24] the judge said: "On the evidence before me, on balance, I do not find it is not unreasonable to expect the third and fourth appellant from leaving the UK with their parents and returning to Nigeria. (sic)" The finding itself is confused and the double negatives had the opposite effect to the one apparently intended by the judge.
- Failure to give appropriate weight to the children's length of residence
The judge made further confused and contradictory findings in relation to the test set out in MA (Pakistan) v SSHD [2016] EWCA Civ 705. At [13] he correctly identified the finding of the Court of Appeal that 'significant weight' must be accorded to the fact that a child had been continuously resident for a period of seven years. When he came to make his findings, the judge confused the test in the following way at [24]: "On the evidence I find that the third and fourth appellants have put down some roots. However, I do not find that there are 'strong reasons' (MA (Pakistan)), at this stage in their lives, it would be detrimental to their development to leave and to return to Nigeria. (sic)" This finding appeared to require the appellants to show 'strong reasons' why it would be detrimental for them to return to Nigeria and failed to give correct weight to the children's length of residence. (iv) Error of law in requiring some form of detriment or welfare concern before it would be unreasonable to expect the children to leave the UK
The third and fourth points dovetail with one another. It is argued that the judge erred at [10], [16] and [22] in requiring detriment or welfare concerns to be shown in relation to the 'reasonableness' test. Although the welfare of the children might be relevant to the assessment of whether it is reasonable to expect a child to leave the UK, the assessment under Article 8 is an evaluative assessment and not solely a welfare assessment. Whether it is reasonable to expect the child to leave the UK is a holistic assessment taking into account all relevant issues including the ties that the children were likely to have developed in the UK. There is no strict requirement for the appellants to show safeguarding
concers.
Decision
24. We have found that it is in the best interests of the children to remain in the UK, the country where they have lived most of their lives and where they have established strong ties over a period of eight years. It is not in their best interests to be returned to Nigeria where the evidence shows that their life chances would be reduced, they would be exposed to an increased risk of discrimination and possibly an increased risk of violence. For these reasons we conclude that it would not be reasonable to expect children who have been resident in the UK for eight years during an important developmental period of their life to leave the UK. Their parents meet the requirements of section 117B(6) NIAA 2002 which states that the public interest does not require their removal in such circumstances.
25. Even if a holistic assessment is conducted under Article 8, where the best interests of the children are weighed against the cumulative effect of public interest considerations, the outcome would be the same. The best interests of the children are a primary consideration albeit not the only consideration. The respondent previously recognised that strong reasons would be needed to outweigh the interests of children who have been resident in the UK for more than seven years. In this case the parents entered the UK legally and had leave to remain until 2013. Further applications for leave to remain on human rights grounds were made promptly but were refused. The appellants did not leave the UK following those negative decisions, but neither is there any evidence to show that the respondent took any action to remove them. Apart from the fact that they remained without leave there is no evidence of abuses of the immigration system at the more serious end of the scale e.g. deception, fraud or absconding. There is no evidence of criminal convictions or other matters that might give additional weight to the public interest in maintaining an effective system of immigration control.
26. To the contrary, the first appellant says that he was not allowed to work so he has spent his time volunteering for several charities. He says that he worked for Peace Parters Charity as a Project Manager, at the 999 club in Lewisham as an Employability Team Member and as a volunteer in the Family Support Team at an organisation called Pecan. Both parents speak English and have qualifications that would assist them to find work. If permitted to work, they are unlikely to be a burden on taxpayers and are better able to integrate into society. Even if we were to conduct a full assessment under Article 8 the public policy considerations are not sufficiently strong to outweigh the interests of children who have been resident in the UK for a period of eight years. For these reasons we also conclude that any removal in consequence of the decision would be disproportionate under Article 8 of the European Convention.
27. We conclude that removal in consequence of the decision is unlawful under section 6 of the Human Rights Act 1998.
The First-tier Tribunal decision involved the making of an error on a point of law
The decision is remade and the appeal is ALLOWED on human rights grounds
Heard at Field House: https://is.gd/qjUusk
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