A recent study revealed that almost 15% of people who qualify for and hold a UK Ancestry Visa are already British Citizens but don’t  know it! Continue Reading

The government announced recently that it will actively encourage “exceptionally talented leaders” in the fields of science, humanities, engineering and the arts to come to the UK by opening a new Tier 1 category entitled “Exceptional Talent”. Continue Reading

Wales, otherwise known as Cymru, is part of the United Kingdom and a country known for its rich history and culture. Here are some facts about this fascinating place. Continue Reading

Following the government’s ‘Statement of Intent’ with regards to changes to the Tier 4 visa set out earlier this year, a first lot of changes was introduced in April and the next lot came into effect on the 4th of July. Continue Reading

New UK visa rules will reward those who contribute to the economic growth with accelerated settlement. Compared to the previous 5-year rule, those investing £10 million in the UK economy may settle after 2 years, while those investing £5 million and/or creating at least 10 jobs may do so after 3. Continue Reading

In light of recent announcements made by Immigration Minister Damien Green, 1st Contact Visas is encouraging Tier 1, 2 and 5 visa holders as well as foreign nationals wanting to switch categories, to make the necessary applications soon so as not to be affected by the proposed changes by the UK Border Agency with a suggested date taking effect on 1 April 2012. Continue Reading

Could you be eligible for a British Passport?

No?

Are you sure?

According to Robyn Cory from 1^st Contact Visas, there are thousands of people – particularly from Commonwealth countries – who often are not aware they may be eligible through Nationality law at the time of their birth and their ancestry that they may be eligible for a UK passport, when in fact they do qualify.

“A nationality status trace through 1^st Contact Visas, along with the relevant supporting documentation could well put you on your way to British citizenship, and all the possibilities that opens up.” Continue Reading

‘Readers Ask’ has been a recent addition to our email newsletter.

We’ve rounded up some of the best questions and answers and provide them here.

This month, we look at Visas, naturalisation and continuous residency.

Robyn Cory of 1st Contact Visas was on hand to give an expert opinion.

___________________________________

Question: If my mother was born in the UK am I eligible for UK citizenship.

Answer: After 13 January 2010 a person who has a British mother will have a right to register as a British citizen under section 4C of the British Nationality Act 1981 if he or she would have become a British citizen at birth had women been able to pass on citizenship in the same way as men

Question: Hi, I have indefinite leave to remain since 2007. How do i go about applying for my british passport and how much would it cost? Thanks

Answer: Once you’ve held Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) for 12 continuous months, you will be eligible to apply for naturalisation; you are required to have passed the Life in the UK Test and should not have spent more than 90 days outside the UK in the final year prior to applying.

Question: I am a South African Passport holder with an Indefinite leave to Remain Stamp in my Passport and will be visiting SA soon Do I require a Visa to re-enter the UK ? The stamp is in my old passport as I have had to renew my passport recently

Answer: Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) is a Permanent Residency status in the UK. Transfer of Conditions (ToC) is an application whereby your current Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR) can be transferred to your new passport by the UK Home Office. Alternatively, in the interim, you can carry both your expired and new passports to provide evidence of your holding of Permanent Residency (ILR) in the UK.

Question: Hi I came uk in june 2008 on 2 years HSMP visa. last year in May 2010 i got an extension in my visa for next three years.After completing 5 years in UK i will apply for the ILR.My question is that when i will apply for the ILR is there any points of the income.As previously when i applied for the extension of my visa I submit all my Bank statements and my employer letter,pay slips which was confirming that i am getting the required salary.

Answer: HSMP /Tier 1 visa issuance after December 2006 will require the HSMP/Tier 1 holder to meet the points criteria including the income criteria as per their last HSMP/Tier 1 extension application.

Question: I obtained a Ancestral Visa for the first time in 2004, and again when I was married in 2007. I left the UK two years ago. Is there a limit to the number of times a person can apply for an Ancestral Visa? Can I apply for another one?

Answer: The UK Immigration law and policy allows for the re-application of Ancestral Visas providing the foreign national can provide all the relevant documenation. To meet the settlement requirement of the Ancestral Visa it is imperative to provide sufficient evidence that the intent is to settle in the United Kingdom. Should your current Ancestral Visa still be valid, in that the expiration date has not yet been met, the Ancestral Visa is a multiple entry visa, and will allow for entry clearance into the UK, until such time as the visa has expired.

Question: I have been granted HSMP Visa until Oct 2012, but my passport is up for renewal in May 2011. Do I need to transfer the HSMP Visa from my old passport to the new passport or can I keep holding on to both expired passport which has the HSMP Visa stamp as well as the new passport?

Answer: You would be able to obtain a new passport and then request a Transfer of Conditions from the Home Office, which is in effect another visa in your new passport, without having to reapply for your current HSMP visa.   Alternatively, you are allowed to obtain a new passport and carry your expired passport with your valid visa. 1^st Contact Visas can assist you with the Transfer of Conditions application.

Question: I’m a Kiwi who came to the UK in 2007 on a 2-year HSMP. In 2009 I switched to a 3 year tier 2 permit having been sponsored by my brand new employer (my old employer thinking it was “too hard”…). As the scheme was new there was a really long wait for my employer’s registration to go through – they were saying on the phone and the internet it would be 6-8 weeks but it ended up being  more like 12 weeks before it was sorted. Unfortunately this meant I had to leave the country as my HSMP ran out after about 9 weeks of waiting, and I had to do the application from NZ. So I was gone from the UK for 2 months and for around 6 weeks of that time, I did not have any legal right to live/work in the UK. My question is, how does this affect my continuous residency? I was hoping that next year at the end of this permit I would have 5 years residency and could apply for permanent residency, but does this enforced departure mean that my first 2 years have to be disregarded and I started from scratch again in 2009?

Answer: Continuous residency is determined by breaks in residency of no more than 90 days at one time out of country, and a total of 180 days within the 5 year period preceding your intention of application for Indefinite Leave to Remain. So you’re OK! Your 6-week period is not enough to hamper your application!

Question: Myself and my daughter have indefinite leave to remain visas. Can you please tell me when we can apply for British passports? We have being in the UK for 4 years now and came in on my wife’s British passport.

Answer: Naturalization is possible after 12 months on Indefinite Leave to Remain.  Some additional criteria of continuous residency must be met. And you should have no more than 90 days within the last year spent out of the country.

Question: My great grandfather was born in Wendron, Cornwall on 17 April 1862. Would I qualify for an ancestral visa based on these details?

Answer: Ancestral Visas are issued for foreign nationals whose grandparent was born in the UK. Unfortunately great grandparents are not considered to meet the criteria.

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For more than 45 years, Australian higher education institutions have accepted TOEFL scores for admissions. Now Australian Minister for Immigration and Citizenship Chris Bowen has announced that from 1 July student visa applicants will be able to use the US-based TOEFL test as proof of their English language proficiency. Continue Reading

Since the 6th of April this year, skilled and highly skilled migrants were added to the list of those required to pass the Life in the UK test in order to qualify for ILR (indefinite leave to remain) in the UK. Continue Reading

As part of the plan to alleviate the skills shortage in regional Australia, particularly in the booming mining industry, immigration minister Chris Bowen recently announced major changes to the visa programme. These changes include increasing the number of skilled migrant places for the 2011/12 Migration Programme to 185 000, as well as increasing the number of family visas.

For the first time, the Australian government is also actively encouraging skilled workers from outside Australia to apply for temporary visas and work in rural areas. These regional visas will be processed as a priority over others and the lure is that it will eventually be easier for these workers to gain permanent residency.

To qualify under the Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme, interested overseas workers will need to prove their trade skills or in-demand professional qualifications, as well as competency in English.

The government also announced the introduction of special migration agreements for big resource projects, where the permanent residency process will be sped up for overseas workers who stay in a regional area on a 457 visa for two years, and whose employer can guarantee another two years’ work.

To find out more about Australian visas or start your application process, visit www.1stcontactvisas.com.

So you’re thinking about moving from the UK to Australia? Immigration websites and forums are always full of questions and conversations about this very move and the consensus seems to be that the grass is indeed greener on the Other Side.

In this article we look at what exactly attracts UK families in particular to the land down under, as well as the steps to take if you’re considering the move. Continue Reading

A recent Transatlantic Trends survey conducted in the United States, Canada, the UK, France, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy has found that Britons are the most anxious nation when it comes to immigrants.

The survey was commissioned by the German Marshall Fund (GMF) in the US, and the results are considered by GMF President Craig Kennedy as a “wake-up” call for governments.

According to Kennedy the survey shows that both North Americans and Europeans have very strong opinions about immigration policies; what works, and what doesn’t, with the Brits in particular having a lot to say about the government’s immigration policies.

• According to the research 59% of Britons believed there were “too many” immigrants in the UK.
• Compared to 10% or less in other countries surveyed, 23% of British people thought immigration was their country’s biggest problem; this despite the fact that 5 of the other nations partaking in the poll had a larger proportion of immigrants than the UK.
• Around 25% of UK respondents don’t believe legal migrants to the UK should be allowed access to the NHS or state schools, and a large number feel that immigrants take jobs from native-born workers.
• 70% of people in the UK said the UK government was doing a poor job managing immigration.
• Immigration Minister Damian Green is quoted as having said he was not surprised that people are sceptical “after a decade of uncontrolled immigration” under the Labour government.

>> Find more transatlantic trends information here.

Immigration Minister Damian Green this week released a Ministerial Statement announcing the closure of the Worker Registration Scheme from the 30th of April 2011. Continue Reading

According to a BBC World Service Country Rating Poll, the UK has risen in popularity since last year and is now considered the 2^nd most popular country in the world, after Germany. Continue Reading

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Earlier this week, Immigration Minister Damian Green issued a Written Ministerial Statement proposing certain immigration and nationality fees increases, set to take effect from 6 April this year. Continue Reading

We have featured South Africa, New Zealand and Australia.

Today we look at Canada and reveal 20 of the country’s most interest facts:

1. At 9 984 670 sq km and comprised of 6 time zones, Canada is huge!
2. Canada is also home to the longest street in the world. Yonge Street in Ontario starts at Lake Ontario, and runs north through Ontario to the Minnesota border, a distance of almost 2000 kilometres.
3. While we’re talking ‘longest’, here’s another record: Canada has the world’s longest coastline at 202 080 km.
4. A bear cub named Winnipeg was exported from Canada to the London Zoo in 1915. A little boy named Christopher Robin Milne loved to visit Winnipeg (or Winnie for short) and his love for the bear cub inspired the stories written by his father, A.A. Milne, about Winnie-the-Pooh.
5. The Canadian motto, A Mari Usque ad Mare, means “From sea to sea.”
6. Toronto’s Rogers Centre (formerly known as the SkyDome) is home to the largest Sony big screen in the world, measuring 10 m x 33.6 m.
7. The Blackberry Smartphone was developed in Ontario, at Research In Motion’s Waterloo offices.
8. The Big Nickel in Sudbury, Ontario is the world’s largest coin. It is a huge reproduction of a 1951 Canadian nickel and measures 9 meters in diameter.
9. Canada has twice been invaded by the USA, first in 1775 and then 1812.
10. Actor Leslie Nielsen is Canadian and his brother Erik was the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada for two years, from 1984 to 1986.
11. Canada holds the record for the most gold medals ever won at the Winter Olympics, since taking 14 Golds at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.
12. Sandy Gardiner, a journalist with the Ottawa Journal in the 60’s coined the term ‘Beatlemania’ while he was writing a story about the Beatles.
13. Canada basically got its name by mistake. When Jaques Cartier, a French explorer, came to the new world, he met with local Natives who invited them to their ‘kanata’ (the word for ‘village’. The party mistakenly thought the name of the country was “Kanata” or Canada.
14. The Mounted Police were formed in 1873, with nine officers and in 1920 merged with the Dominion Police to become the famous Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which today has close to 30 000 members.
15. Canada is home to about 55 000 different species of insects.
16. Montreal is home to many beautiful churches and is often called The City of Saints or City of a hundred bell towers.
17. Ontario is believed to be home to the world’s smallest jail, which measures only 24.3 sq metres.
18. The Hotel de Glace in Quebec is built every year using 400 tons of ice and 12 000 tons of snow. Every summer it melts away and every winter it is rebuilt.
19. Canada’s only desert in British Columbia, is only 15 miles long and is the only desert in the world with a long boardwalk for visitors to walk on.
20. Famous Canadians include Pamela Anderson, Leonard Cohen, Avril Lavigne, Keanu Reeves and Jim Carrey.

Immigration Canada is planning to reduce immigrant visas by 5 per cent in 2011, according to Richard Kurland, a Vancouver immigration lawyer who obtained the data under an ‘Access to Information’ request. Continue Reading

On 23 November 2010, the Home Secretary announced a number of changes to UK immigration law and policy as part of the government’s commitment to place a limit on non-EU migration to the UK. Continue Reading