Leave to remain as a stateless person in the UK

Legal Updates

A stateless person, as defined by the 1954 Convention relating to the Status of Stateless Persons is “a person who is not considered as a national by any State under the operation of its law”.

Although the UK signed up the 1954 Convention, there was no formal mechanism for recognising and providing protection to stateless people until 2013.

Read more
someone writing on a pile of papers on a desk with their right hand. there's a mug in the background

Thinking about evidence in family life, rights of the child cases

Legal Updates

At one of the training sessions we ran this week with volunteers who are keen to learn more and do more for people seeking the right to remain in the UK – we looked at evidence.  What ‘evidence’ means, in the context of asylum, immigration and human rights cases.  How someone can get this evidence, and how others can help them.  We discussed how important documentary evidence is, when so many legal cases are refused on the basis of credibility – the Home Office or the courts don’t believe you are telling the truth.

Read more
checklist

Preparing in case of detention

Legal Updates

Much of the Right to Remain Toolkit is based on people’s direct experience of the asylum and immigration system, and the ideas and actions they have found helpful to navigate the system and survive.

That’s particularly true for the Toolkit section on Preparing in Case of Detention.

Read more
Detention centre walkway

Post-detention accommodation – briefing from BID

Legal Updates

Last month, the organisation Bail for Immigration Detainees (BID) released a briefing on the current situation of post-detention accommodation.

Already a problematic area, post-detention accommodation is now a crisis situation following the changes made in January 2018 (which you can read about on our blog here) which included the abolition of Section 4(1) accommodation. This accommodation was provided by the Home Office to people released from detention with nowhere else to stay, and with no other forms of support available to them.

Read more
Detention centre walkway

Children taken into care as Home Office breaks own guidance on family separations

Legal Updates

The Guardian newspaper reported this weekend on a distressing story of three children aged eight, six and five, who were taken into care when the Home Office detained their father, Kenneth Oranyendu.

The three children, and the children’s mother, are British citizens. Their mother is currently in Nigeria, attending a family funeral. Mr Oranyendu does not currently have the right to remain in the UK, and the Home Office is attempting to deport him from the UK (he has completed a three-year criminal sentence).

Read more

8 reasons to hate the new bail procedures

Legal Updates

This is a guest post by Tom Kemp. Tom is a member of SOAS Detainee Support and a PhD Student at Kent Law School. He is currently writing about anti-detention activism and political thinking in the everyday work of anti-border social movements.

Most of Schedule 10 of the Immigration Act 2016 were brought into force this month. Here’s 8 reason to hate them.

Read more

Video: find out more about “signing support” for people at risk of detention

Legal Updates

Most people who have applied for asylum or other immigration status and have not had a positive decision have to regularly report at their local Home Office reporting centre or a police station. At every reporting visit, the person is at risk of detention, particularly if their application has been refused, which they may not know until they go and report.

This is why ‘signing support’ is such an important way of providing practical solidarity.

Find out more in this short film about the Bristol Signing Support group.

Read more
image of someone giving testimony about persecution

Preparing for the asylum interview – from those who have been there

Legal Updates

Over the years of working with people going through the asylum and immigration system, we have seen how disastrously unprepared most people are going into their asylum substantive interview.

This is one of the reasons we produce the Right to Remain Toolkit, and why we’re working with a new group in Sheffield to help new asylum-seekers prepare for their asylum interview.

Read more