A new battle dawns -- New fees on their way

[RobinLondon]

Just when you thought the 4-->5 change was draconian, get ready to shell out a whole lot more for applications after April 2007:

http://www.ind.homeoffice.gov.uk/aboutu ... nsultatio1

I think this is going to hurt.

[British]

I think all this is just a joke.

Quite frankly, which immigrant or a visa applicant is going to say "Oh well Sir! I want to apply for a UK visa, but the visa application cost is too high, so please cut it into half and i will apply then!" Ha!

If the govt. wants to increase the cost and pass it on to immigrants / applicants, i can't think of anyone in Britain who will object to it!!!!!! :-) (of course other than immigrants themselves. But who in Britain fights for immigrant's rights and issues??????? Final answer??? Its Mr. Nobody!)

So if that is case, who are they consulting with?????? :-)
I just cannot believe this stunt!

Come 'on, Hon'ble Govt. Simply raise the fees and charge the immigrants! You know they will pay, pay and pay!!!!!!!!!!;-)

Anyway... I enjoyed this joke!

[OL7MAX]

The consultation is not about prices, ...it asks whether applicants should contribute towards the costs of the whole immigration system from application to enforcement.

Which means it is exactly about prices, the question being: Should we charge immigrants extra, and are the below good excuses for raising the fees?

And then they have the cheek to garnish with adjectives like "Fair, Effective, Transparent and Trust (sic)"

[tvt]

My sources indicated to me that ILR would cost £1,000 under the new charging regime.

[JAJ]

My sources indicated to me that ILR would cost £1,000 under the new charging regime.

Still a bargain price. Are you suggesting otherwise?

[ppron747]

I certainly would be, were I liable for it.....
How does it compare with Canada or Australia?

[JAJ]

I certainly would be, were I liable for it.....
How does it compare with Canada or Australia?

Standard fee for migration to Australia is typically AUD1,990. This covers a family unit. Some offshore family visas cost about AUD600 less. Citizenship costs AUD120 per adult applicant, children under 16 included for free.
http://www.immi.gov.au/allforms/990i.htm

Canada charges an application fee of CAD550 per adult applicant, and CAD150 for a dependent child PLUS a "Right of Permanent Residence" fee of CAD490 for every family member. Citizenship costs CAD200 for each adult, CAD100 for a child under 18.
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/applications/fees.html

[RobinLondon]

My sources indicated to me that ILR would cost £1,000 under the new charging regime.

Still a bargain price. Are you suggesting otherwise?

I'm not sure it is, but I would imagine that that's a decision for each individual to make. A key point in one of the consulting documents concerns the relative price inelasticity of demand of immigration fees. The Government feels that migrants will pay any price to attain leave. Alternatively, if demand was price elastic, a increase in price would result in a drop in applications or vice versa.

From the Government's point of view, IND fees--like the London congestion charge--should be viewed entirely as user fees. Namely, if you use the service, you should pay the charge. Although the point was made 16 months ago that the new £335/500 price regime was an attempt to capture some of the costs for prosecution and enforcement, that argument is now being eroded. Now even those rates don't cover anything but basic administration services. A more likely story is that the higher rates will be used to fund the sizeable increase in costs associated with the incoming biometric schemes. If the case before was that the general taxpayer was subsidising the immigration directorate, this may be a case of the migrant subsidising a larger societal burden. It makes it sound a bit like restitution.

Ultimately...and given that the average migrant will have little to no impact on the process despite the magnanimous and detailed consultation arrangements...the decision to remain in this country will depend on one's own perspective, experiences and prospects. Unless Canada, Australia, the US and the EU all decide in some cartel-like action to raise their own fees in a similar lock-step, the global migrant can just shop around for a "better" place to live. There are of course costs associated iwth that, particularly for the migrant already settled to large degree in the UK, even if only in a largely de facto manner.

For me personally, the decision to spend two years working in Germany from 2001 to 2003 was a definite setback in terms of my own EU immigration status. I have watched the fees and conditions rise steadily since my original arrival in the UK in 1998. Although I appreciate the need for users to bear the costs of the system, it appears to be nonetheless cynically managed. On the one hand, migrants do add benefits to any society, a fact which appears to be consistently given short shrift. On the other, despite the reiteration that neither this consultation nor the previous 4-->5 year change was about prices per se, fees are a significant and most immediate burden upon any migrant and his or her family. Mr Byrne doesn't feel the messy reality of the ouch because he'll never have to pay it. The same can't be said for the nurse/programmer/researcher/etc. and his or her spouse and their children who'll have to part with small fortunes to stay. I guarantee that the fine semantic distinction between the high costs and the newly "fair and flexible" system will be meaningless to them.

As the UK depends increasingly on internal-EU migration to fill its labour needs, it has more clout to exploit the price inelasticity of demand of its fees. It will continue to do so until migrants change the reality of the situation and demonstrate that increases in prices do lead to reductions in applications. According to rational choice models, each one of us will have to do the mental arithmetic of the total costs and benefits of living in this country. One needs to be as unemotional and unsentimental about it as the IND appears to be. If in your personal situation, the benefits don't exceed the costs, well then, you're just going to have to be prepared to leave, giving the two-fingered salute to this country on your way out the door.

[Rogerio]

Rob, brilliantly written. And I totally agree - a very personal decision to make. Thank you for taking the time to write. Rogerio.

[RobinLondon]

Thanks for your comments, Rogerio. In many ways this is a personal decision. Ultimately it has to be given the nature of this country's and most parliamentary-style democracies. Apart from writing to our MPs and attempting to influence them on the issue, there really is very little that we as small civic beans can do to determine the process. When the UK as a nation elected this current Government, we gave them the power to take such decisions, and that's what they're doing. There's nothing illegal about raising immigration and nationality fees, and it's perfectly within their role, even if we may consider it to be bad policy. If we are excluded from shaping the national agenda, then it becomes an individual's personal decision if he or she wishes to stick around.

Despite all this talk about individual decisions, there is a social element that must not be overlooked. The role of immigration programmes, if they are to be implemented correctly, must be integration programmes as well. On the one hand, the migrant needs to learn the country's language and how to get along with his or her co-residents. These are very practical skills and lessons to be learned. On the other hand, there is also the need to encourage social cohesion for everyone, rich and poor. Whereas there are costs to be paid by migrants to come to and settle in this country, they must not be so high as to be punitive. It is in no one's interest to discourage integration or cohesion; they are the basis of every functioning nation-state. Changing the goalposts for integration, whether directly by conditions or indirectly by fees, is precisely a type of hindrance. Thus this would seem to be inherently contrary to the Government's larger stated goals.

If the IND starts explicitly pricing its services based on value in addition to cost, they are commercialising the nature of UK citizenship. Within the consultation notes, such a change has been stated to be one of the primary drivers behind the new fee rises. If that's the case, then coming to the UK is viewed by both parties as a purely business decision. Creating cohesive community links becomes secondary. Participating in lovely citizenship ceremonies, a farce. Personally, I'm not sure that I would feel comfortable living in a community so commercially defined. For me at least, it puts a hefty price tag on communal involvement. It underlines the costs in what should be the constrained altruism of neighbourly interactions.

How surprising is that? I intended to go on about the importance of social factors and I arrive back at individual choice once again. Maybe that's just what it's going to to come down to after all. It's about me, not the community I'm aspiring to join. Gee, maybe the divine Mrs T was right all along. There really is no such thing as society after all. And how funny that this Labour government has come around to seeing it her way too.

[tvt]

RobinLondon,

I don't think the Home Office bothers to much about social cohesion etc. They just see legal immigrants as lucrative cash cows always available to be milked.

[RobinLondon]

They just see legal immigrants as lucrative cash cows always available to be milked.

I heard that!

[rooi_ding]

I would be quite happy to pay the prices if they actually did there jobs properly (if they did then there would be very little need for this forum). Maybe if the IND was privatised then they would perform better instead of sitting on there butts all day and coming up with pathetic excuses. Its a fact civil servants are to highly paid for there job responsibility but are the least qualified for the position.

If a private company was running things then there would be no jobs worth messing with our lives instead there would be business minded people dealing other business minded people.

[Dawie]

If they just abolished immigration control there wouldn't be any need for any of this rubbish.

[olisun]

If they just abolished immigration control there wouldn't be any need for any of this rubbish.

and every person from every poor country would overcrowd this small island..

[rooi_ding]

The whole concept of migrant work is to go somewhere to improve your quality of life (the British empire was created through this concept), when the work dries up then the migrant worker will just go were the work is. Thus you would more then likely get a balance where poorer countries would benefit by sending money back to there countries of origin and the host country would benefit by having a labour force that would be more productive and except lower wages until there skills have improved and the the migrant would move onto a better prospect. There might be a big rush in the beginning and local labour might realise they have tough competition but this is a capitalistic market people will not go were they can not find work.

[Dawie]

The whole concept of migrant work is to go somewhere to improve your quality of life (the British empire was created through this concept), when the work dries up then the migrant worker will just go were the work is. Thus you would more then likely get a balance where poorer countries would benefit by sending money back to there countries of origin and the host country would benefit by having a labour force that would be more productive and except lower wages until there skills have improved and the the migrant would move onto a better prospect. There might be a big rush in the beginning and local labour might realise they have tough competition but this is a capitalistic market people will not go were they can not find work.

I couldn't agree more. The idea that masses of poor people would come flooding into Britain if there were no immigration control is just wrong in my very humble opinion.

Firstly, there's the simple fact that poor people wouldn't be able to afford to get here! Most of the illegal immigrants who come here hiding in trucks or by other underground means have paid thousands of dollars in order to be smuggled into Britain. Most of them come from relatively well-off families in their country of origin, but are just looking for an opportunity to work here. Your average starving African living on $1 a day just simply couldn't afford to get here, regardless of immigration control.

Secondly, why would poor people come to Britain just to be poor here? Away from their families, their homeland and everything that's dear to them. They wouldn't. They would either come here to make money, like the rest of us, or they would go home. Unfortunately due to strict immigration controls, we have the perverse effect of trapping hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants in this country because they are too scared to go home for fear of never being able to return here.

Thirdly, and this is related to my first point, anyone who has the financial means to get here, legally or illegaly, on an Easyjet flight, or clinging onto the bottom of a Eurostar train or lorry, is here already. And guess what, those that come here illegaly are laughing all the way to the bank because they don't have to pay a penny in taxes.

Fourthly, it will eventually become inevitable that the government is going to have to rethink its approach to immigration control sooner or later because immigration control just simply doesn't work! You just have to look at the hundreds of thousands (maybe even over a million) of illegal immigrants in this country. They aren't going anywhere soon and why should they? It is a practical impossibility to deport them all and the government is just delaying the inevitable by not granting some sort of amnesty. Not to mention the hundreds of millions in extra tax revenue they would gain by doing so.

[OL7MAX]

If they just abolished immigration control there wouldn't be any need for any of this rubbish.

Dawie, I've always liked your signature message. It inspired a long and interesting discussion I recently had with some friends. That universal antipathy to immigration presumes immigration erodes personal wealth and quality of life. And based on that premise the conclusion is logical. However, the premise if flawed. Lower costs means lower prices and existing residents actually get richer (can afford more with the same money).

Well, not all of them. Admittedly the lower paid ones will have competition for their jobs. And there will be higher unemployment among that section of the native population. However, this is a short term consequence. With substantially lower wage costs the economy sees low inflation, low interest rates, good business environment, massively higher exports etc., and the country is more likely to see full employment.

But if immigration controls were removed all over the world it would free governments of many billions and billions of expense, free millions of "unproductive" civil servants to contribute to society in a more meaningful way, and bring untold other benfits in the long run. Combine that with disbanding the WTO and lifting all trade barriers... and that will be the smartest thing mankind has ever done!

Great posts, RobinLondon.

If the case before was that the general taxpayer was subsidising the immigration directorate...

The general taxpayer doesn't subsidise the IND, he picks up the tab for IND failures. The cost of those failure range from crime caused by illegal immigrants ... to the tax revenue those immigrants don't pay. If the expectation is that the legal immigrants should pick up the costs of IND failures, where does that end? Would they be expected at some point in the future to pick up the tab for that lost tax revenue as well? My point is that immigrants should be charged the FULL costs of a competent handling of their application.... and no more.

the global migrant can just shop around for a "better" place to live

That's not strictly true. If I qualify for UK ILR because my wife's British it means I've got grounds to get a UK ILR. There is no mobility there allowing me to choose Canada or Australia instead.

the government is just delaying the inevitable by not granting some sort of amnesty.

I agree. The short-sightedness of this government knows no bounds. Apart from taxes there are scores of good reasons to announce a limited amnesty. I listed several of them in this previous thread of yours. There hasn't been a rush of posters explaining why it's not a good idea (apart from the NIMBY sentiment)

JAJ, thanks for your figures. It shows that even if the HO Was remotely as efficient as other countries' immigration departments our HO is exhorbitant and poor value. If Australia charges £200 per applicant (1,990 AUD = approx £808 per family of - average - 4 members), and Canada charges £254 (550 CAD) why does the UK need £1000 per applicant? Maybe they need to outsource this.

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[Dawie]

Whenever I have the occasional debate with people about the total abolition of immigration controls they think I am a little mad. But think about this: we have been fed propoganda about immigrants for years, brainwashed to think that they steal jobs, sponge off the state, will all come flooding here in their masses and generally be responsible for everthing from traffic congestion to crime.

Even the most rational, intelligent people I have met succumb to this propoganda and yet there absolutely NO IMPERICAL EVIDENCE that immigrants are responsible for any of this.

Whenever I have this debate I like to refer my interlocuters to a brilliantly written little book called "Open Borders: The Case Against Immigration Controls". This link on Amazon can be found here:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Open-Borders-Ag ... F8&s=books

Have a read and start thinking with your head instead looking at the topic with all that dearly beloved anti-immigrant propoganda that has been fed to us for so long.

[ppron747]

I don't think you're a little mad, Dawie....

Neither do I think that your interlocutors necessarily need the book. Interlocutors are just people with whom you communicate. I think you want people who disagree with you to read it.

I happen to be one of them, and I deeply resent the implication in your final paragraph that anyone who disagrees with you does so because they have been influenced by dearly beloved anti-immigration propaganda. I disagree with you because I think you are wrong, not because someone else has told me what to think.

[rooi_ding]

So what do you think? ppron747 what is your argument against an open border policy. You must have formulated ideas from something.........

[ppron747]

I don't do formulation...

Kayalami put it brilliantly a few months ago, and I thought at the time "I wish I'd written that". I'm sure Dawie will remember it.

Unfortunately, connection problems or server overload are preventing me from searching for the post in question - it has just taken me six minutes to access a single Kayalami message, which turned out not to be the one...

[JAJ]

JAJ, thanks for your figures. It shows that even if the HO Was remotely as efficient as other countries' immigration departments our HO is exhorbitant and poor value. If Australia charges £200 per applicant (1,990 AUD = approx £808 per family of - average - 4 members), and Canada charges £254 (550 CAD) why does the UK need £1000 per applicant? Maybe they need to outsource this.

The average Australian migrant has only just over 1 dependent. Many are single, or are spouses of Australian citizens.

For Canada, you have to add the Right of Permanent Residence fee.

[RobinLondon]

Canada charges an application fee of CAD550 per adult applicant, and CAD150 for a dependent child PLUS a "Right of Permanent Residence" fee of CAD490 for every family member. Citizenship costs CAD200 for each adult, CAD100 for a child under 18.
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/applications/fees.html

Not quite right. The RPRF is not payable by every family member, but only by the principal applicant and his/her spouse. Dependents under 22 are free.

From the CIC website:

This fee is payable by principal applicants (with some exceptions) and accompanying spouses and common-law partners. It must be paid before the immigrant visa is issued overseas or before the applicant becomes a permanent resident in Canada.

The following applicants are not required to pay this fee:

dependent children of a principal applicant or sponsor, a child to be adopted, or an orphaned brother, sister, niece, nephew or grandchild; and protected persons, including Convention refugees.

So the cost for someone to migrate to Canada and become a citizen is C$1,240, or £574 from start to finish. In my case (UK ancestry), coming to the UK has cost or will cost in today's prices: £150 for the first visa, £335 for the one-year extension, another £335 for ILR plus £300 (UK test + naturalisation fee) = £1,120. Mind you, those are today's current rates without the proposed value or cost-recapture charges or in-person premiums.

I'm not trying to be glib or flip or whatever. I'm just demonstrating that the UK fees already exceed those of what is supposed to be a key competitor country. Whether this fact will have any bearing on the new commercialised approach to pricing, time will only tell.

[Dawie]

I don't think you're a little mad, Dawie....

Neither do I think that your interlocutors necessarily need the book. Interlocutors are just people with whom you communicate. I think you want people who disagree with you to read it.

I happen to be one of them, and I deeply resent the implication in your final paragraph that anyone who disagrees with you does so because they have been influenced by dearly beloved anti-immigration propaganda. I disagree with you because I think you are wrong, not because someone else has told me what to think.

Maybe you'll agree with me once you've read the book