Highly Skilled migrants approach the court over the 'unfair' rules imposed by UK Home Office.

Published on Wed 7th Feb 2007

Highly Skilled Migrants (HSMP) in UK has finally taken the legal step against the UK Home Office in order to challenge the unfair new legislation. Precisely within 3 months the HSMP visa holders in UK need to file a Judicial Review in the High Court after which a group Judicial Review (class action) is not entertained as per law. Almost 90% of the 49,000 HSMP immigrants (plus their families) are affected due to the retrospective changes implemented by the UK Home Office in November 2006.

The changes have been imposed on the HSMP holders retrospectively in an undemocratic manner without any consultation with the stakeholders or notification to the HSMP visa holders. Altogether the new change is a complete change of track of the UK Home Office from its initial promises made to HSMP immigrants.

The UK Home office has been introducing controversial new policies consistently. Initially it had been in March 2006 when the Indian and other non-EEA doctors were asked to make other arrangements or depart due to the UK Government's preference towards Doctors from EEA countries. This attitude was continued by increasing the settlement period for ILR (indefinite leave to remain) for work permit and HSMP holders from 4 to 5 years in April 2006. All these changes resulted in Judicial Reviews against the Home Office.

Finally a more drastic action was taken by UK Government by introducing new changes on 8th November 2006 which denied HSMP holders' basic right for visa extension as it was initially promised. The HSMP immigrants joined together on a common platform called HSMP Forum and have hired services of a legal firm Bates Wells & Braithwaite to challenge the new rules thru a judicial review. Their lawyers are Chris Randall & Philip Trott. According to Mr Randall, under previous rules they would have had a legitimate expectation that they would "qualify for extensions of stay and eventually for indefinite leave to remain in the UK".

The letter before action or legal notice issued to UK Home Office very recently by HSMP Forum's lawyers says "that the Home Office was specifically seeking to attract individuals to come to the UK for its own benefit and also the information provided during the individual HSMP holders entrance was part and parcel of the process of encouragement for people to come to the UK", thus in a way luring the unfortunate immigrants.

HSMP immigrants who have made many sacrifices to make UK their main home now won't qualify for further visa extensions due to these new changes. Due to which they will have to wind up their establishments, careers, schooling of their children, and investments and will have to leave the Country.

Sonal Thakkar who came on HSMP from Baroda, India with her husband and 10 year old child said "I am pregnant, and my due date is 6th of April after my due date I need to have a minimum of 3 months of rest, so how will I be able to prove my income with such a situation and a contractual job? And by these changes I have stressed a lot and the Doctor says it can have effect on my new baby. I and my husband are very depressed in the family; my 10 year old child has made lot of friends here and now feels very sad of leaving them. We would not have come to this country if we were not promised about the Permanent residency".

In another case Hanish Sevak, who worked for Citigroup as a senior manager in Ahmedabad, India and is in UK since past 4 years said "I disposed off all my household belongings, liquidated all of my financial assets and invested my life savings to migrate and re-establish my family in the United Kingdom. My daughter had to give up her education in one of the best private schools in India and had to adapt to the new education system in the United Kingdom. My wife has undertaken various courses of childcare and has done considerable voluntary work in this field after coming to the United Kingdom. We embraced all the challenges of adapting to a new environment and now we are being asked to leave".

The letter before action further states that the 'Secretary of State cannot lawfully fail to respect the legitimate expectations of those already granted permission to remain under the pre-existing scheme. To do so, where people have taken life changing decisions on the basis of previous statements, is to fundamentally and unfairly change the goalposts'.

Lawyers of the HSMP Forum further states in the notice, "There could be no greater unfairness than enticing people to come to the UK and to commit their future lives here for the benefit of the UK, only to change the rules under which they entered."

Once the case is submitted on 5th Feb 2007 for a judicial review in high court, it might last three to five months before the judgment is finally announced.

The HSMP Immigrants are expecting a remedy to be treated as per the old rules 'of visa extensions based on economic activity alone'.

Amit Kapadia, coordinator of the HSMP Forum said "We wish the UK Government would wake up and stick to their promises and would revoke retrospective changes. We are very hopeful that the Judicial Review would bring us the desired results but are worried about the prospects of individuals whose visas would be expiring during the legal battle in case we don't get a stay order"