Your Documents!

You are entitled to the originals or copies of every document the Home Office, your solicitor/caseworker issue that concerns your case; it is your right in law.

It is not uncommon that solicitors/case workers do not give copies of all documents to their clients. You MUST insist that they do!

You may have changed your solicitor and asked for your documents and they refuse to release them unless monies are paid. In some circumstances this may be unlawful and you can take legal action to recover the documents. (This can be a very complicated process and take time).

You may have finished with your solicitor/caseworker, they have given you all copies of your documents and you have lost them.

The Home Office have copies of all documents concerning your case, some of these documents you may have never seen. You are entitled in law to see *documents that the Home Office has on your case and you can obtain these documents under the Freedom of Information Act from the 'Subject Access Bureau' (SAB).

NCADC would 'Signpost' all, who are in the immigration system, especially campaigns, write to SAB the cost is £10's. There might be information held by the Home Office not revealed to you or your solicitor/caseworker, which may be of benefit to your case.

Are you in detention?

What are the Home Office playing at? - Now's your chance to find out

Don't understand why you have been kept in detention for months/years on end?

Seems like the Home Office does not give you detailed reasons for continuing to detain you? Or they give lots of detailed reasons but many of them are incorrect?

It might be possible that there is a barrier to your removal that the Home Office have not and would not readily divulge. Bail hearing after bail hearing the Home Office representatives often paint a misleading picture and often do not update their continuing objections to bail, always relying on the original material presented to the court.

You are entitled to see the file the Home Office keeps on you - there may be information in the file as to why the Home Office cannot remove you immediately or in the foreseeable future, and having that information may assist you to make bail.

Requests for personal data from UKBA

Information as provided by UKBA @ 23rd November 2010

This bulletin explains how you can make a request to see the personal information about you that is held by the UK Border Agency.

The processing of personal data (information relating to living individuals) is governed by the Data Protection Act 1998, which makes it possible for you to request access to this information.

Such a request is called a Subject Access Request (SAR), and you should expect a response from UKBA within 40 days.

Making a Subject Access Request (SAR)

Anyone subject to immigration rules can make a request for information (their immigration history) that UKBA hold about them - you do not need any special skills or qualifications.

To make an SAR, you must provide:

* a cheque or postal order for £10, payable to 'The Home Office Accounting Officer'; and

* sufficient personal information to enable us to uniquely identify you - for example, a copy of your passport or driver's licence, original utility bills, and your Home Office reference number if you have one.

If you do not provide these, or if the 'pay' line of the cheque or postal order is not completed correctly, UKBA will reject your application and return it with a letter setting out what is missing. Your request will not be processed.

If you are applying for an SAR on behalf of someone else (for example, if you are acting on behalf of a child aged between 12 and 17 years), you must also provide a signed authority from that person, confirming that you are acting on their behalf. This must be an original - copies will not be accepted. If you do not provide this, UKBA will return your SAR to you with a letter setting out what is missing, and your request will not be processed.

Please note that you do not need to provide a signed authority if you are applying on behalf of a child who is less than 12 years old.

If you just want UKBA to provide you with a specific document, please just ask for that; this will make it easier for UKBA to respond to your request.

If you include a dependant on your SAR and you have only paid one £10 fee, it is likely that we will request another £10 fee if we identify separate records for both parties.

Please send your SAR to:

DPU SAR
UK Border Agency
Lunar House
40 Wellesley Road
Croydon
CR9 2BY

When you make an SAR, it is helpful if you can say why you want the information you are asking for. This may assist us to find the information more quickly.

If you have already made an SAR via a representative - and we have responded to it - and you change your representative, please tell your new representative that you have already received information from us.

Requests for other types of information

The Freedom of Information Act gives you the right to request general information about UKBA work. You can find out how to make a request on the Freedom of information requests page.
To access the page, click here . . . .

If you want information about the progress of an application that you have made, you should contact one of our contact centres. However, you cannot ask for an update until a certain time has passed since you made your application. The Contact centres page tells you when you can ask for an update, and you can find out the standard waiting time for application decisions by looking at the section of this website covering your type of application.

Making a complaint

If you are not satisfied with the response to your SAR, you can seek an independent review by writing to:

The Deputy Director
UK Border Agency
11th Floor, Lunar House
40 Wellesley Road
Croydon
CR9 2BY

Please state when and to whom your original request was made.