Tier 5 (Youth mobility) – introducing “Deemed Sponsorship Status”
13 January 2012
Earlier this week Immigration Rules came into force widening the scope of the Tier 5 (Youth Mobility) immigration route. "Youth Mobility” is one half of Tier 5 (the other being Tier 5 (Temporary Workers). It replaced the old "working holidaymaker” scheme with effect from November of 2008.Successful applicants are called Tier 5 (Youth Mobility) Migrants, and are admitted to the United Kingdom for a period of 2 years, during which they have pretty much unlimited access to the UK’s employment market.
But Tier 5 (Youth Mobility) Migrants have to come from the countries listed at Appendix G to the Immigration Rules as countries participating in the scheme, which means they have to be nationals of Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand, Monaco and, since the implementation of Statement of Changes in the Immigration Rules HC1693 on Monday 9 January 2012, Taiwan.
Applications under this route have always been limited. In other words a limited number of places are available for each participating country. From 9 January 2012 these allocation figures are listed against each country in Appendix G.No explanation of why the Rules have been changed to include these figures in them is given in the Statement of Changes – but it’s probably not unfair to speculate that it is to avoid any challenge to the Rules on the basis that requirements for entry clearance must be contained in the Rules themselves and can’t just be set by the Secretary of State, i.e. the kind of issue that has bedevilled the Immigration Rules since the Court of Appeal’s judgment in Pankina v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2010] EWCA Civ 719 in June of 2010.
The big change however is the introduction of "Deemed Sponsorship Status”. Before the changes on 9 January 2012 all applicants under this route had to be sponsored by their national authorities. Now all the countries listed in Appendix G – apart from the newcomer Taiwan – have been given Deemed Sponsorship Status, and their nationals no longer need to provide Certificates of Sponsorship.
In the Statement of Changes’ "explanatory notes” it is said that Deemed Sponsorship Status is a status conferred upon a country or a territory provided that it is "low risk” – by which the United Kingdom Border Agency means that comparatively few applications for visas from nationals of those countries are refused on the basis that they are not genuine.
Back in July of last year the UKBA implemented a similar scheme for "low risk countries” whose nationals wish to apply for entry clearance or for leave to remain as a Tier 4 (General) Student. People from those countries have to meet less stringent tests for the authentication of the documents they have to submit in support of their applications.
The relaxation of such restrictive practices may well make applications for entry clearance as a Tier 5 (Youth Mobility) Migrant more attractive than it had been for nationals of the participating countries (except, so far, for people from Taiwan). Anyone considering making such an application is strongly advised to seek professional legal advice.