The meaning of ‘foreign criminal’ is not consistent over the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 and the UK Borders Act 2007.
Section 32 of the 2007 Act creates a designated class of offender that is a foreign criminal and establishes the consequences of such designation. That is, for the purposes of section 3(5)(a) of the Immigration Act 1971, the deportation of that person is conducive to the public good and the respondent must make a deportation order in respect of that person.
A temporal link is established by section 32(1) requiring the foreign offender not to be a British citizen at the date of conviction.
Part 5A of the 2002 Act prescribes a domestically refined approach to the public interest considerations which the Tribunal is required to take into account when considering article 8 in a deportation appeal. Unlike the 2007 Act it is not a statutory change to the power to deport, rather it is a domestic refinement as to the consideration of the public interest question.
Part 5A establishes no temporal link to the date of conviction, rather the relevant date for establishing whether an offender is a foreign criminal is the date of the decision subject to the exercise of an appeal on human rights grounds under section 82(1)(b) of the 2002 Act.
In such a case, the weight to be given to former British citizenship is case-sensitive.
Citations:
[2020] UKUT 312 (IAC)
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Immigration
Updated: 28 May 2022; Ref: scu.656757
