UK Border Agency: Visa Applications

Lord Dholakia Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, it is neither a lack of will nor of resources, and we are still trying to push these things on as fast as we can. The noble Baroness quite rightly refers to the Crime and Courts Bill; we are in the middle of its Committee stage and we will discuss those provisions when we get to them some time in July. However, it is right to make the point that we think we will be able to provide a better service to a number of people by withdrawing those appeal procedures as a result of them then being able to apply again.

I want to make clear, as I made clear in my original response to the noble Lord, Lord McConnell is that we take these findings very seriously indeed and we will continue to push them forward. However, the chief inspector produces four or five different reports a year and it takes time to push them forward. He is talking about issues that he looked at back in February, obviously changes have occurred since then and we hope things are better as a result of actions we took following his report. Obviously some things have moved on since then.

[Lord Dholakia]

My Lords, will the Minister take into account the fact that when a visa application has been refused, the individual’s reapplication should not be considered by the same entry clearance officer the second time around?

[Lord Henley]

I cannot give any guarantee that the application will be looked at by a different officer, but in most cases it obviously will be looked at by a different officer because the situation will have moved on.