Significant increase in fees for appealing Home Office decisions in the UK
Published: 1 Jun 2016
Dear All,
Those of you who provide advice and assistance to women making immigration applications in the UK should be aware of government plans to massively increase fees to appeal Home Office decisions.
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has released its proposal to increase fees for First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber) applications from UKP 140, the current fee for an oral appeal hearing, to UKP 800. This represents an increase of over 500%. The policy rationale is that those appealing should bear the full cost of the appeal without any costs being subsidised by the UK taxpayer.
In addition, the MoJ also proposes introducing new fees for further appeals to the Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum Chamber), including UKP 455 to apply for permission to appeal from the First-Tier Tribunal, UKP 350 to apply for permission to appeal from the Upper Tribunal, and UKP 510 for an appeal in the Upper Tribunal.
Under the current rules, the following individuals are exempted from paying appeal fees:
- those in receipt of asylum support;
- those in receipt of legal aid; and
- those in receipt of support under Section 17 of the Children Act (1989).
These exemptions will remain under the new proposals, and the MoJ is considering adding further categories of people to the list of those exempted from paying fees. Now is the time to tell them who we think should be added to that list!
You will see the glaring hole in the current list of exemptions, namely those who are no longer eligible for legal aid but cannot afford to pay fees. Under the current rules, they could apply to the Tribunal for a fee remission by citing “exceptional circumstances”. Here at Rights of Women, we think this does not go far enough, and we want to see the introduction of a fixed assessment of individual means so that those who cannot afford to pay fees are exempted from doing so.
The MoJ has proposed an exemption based on the current Home Office fee waiver policy. In view of how difficult it is for eligible clients to be successful in fee waiver applications and the large number that subsequently need to resort to judicial review, we at Rights of Women think is a bad idea. Many of you will have experience of the Home Office fee waiver policy in action, and it is important that the MoJ are made aware of the many problems with it.
The MoJ is consulting now on their proposals, and details of how to participate in the consultation can be found here. The consultation will close on 3 June. If you and/or your organisation has any capacity to spare, we urge you to respond to this consultation and provide examples of your service users who would simply not be able to afford these fees and would effectively be “priced out” of justice unless robust exemptions are put in place.
If you are an organisation considering responding to the consultation, I would be happy to discuss with you directly.
Kind regards
Nicole Masri
Legal Officer (Immigration & Asylum)
Rights of Women