Witness in UK House of Lords enquiry into family migration policies

The Justice and Home Affairs Committee of the UK House of Lords has conducted an inquiry into family migration. As part of this inquiry, the Committee considered family migration policies in Canada, the Netherlands, and Norway to compare them with UK family migration policies. It sought to identify best practices, lessons learnt, and potential synergies. The evidence received may inspire recommendations in the Committee’s report.

At the request of the committee, Dr Saskia Bonjour and Susan Diepenmaat presented written evidence on ‘Family Migration Policies in the Netherlands’. This report can be found here.

In the fourth oral evidence session of this enquiry, oral evidence was presented by Professor Audrey Macklin, Dr Helga Eggebø, and Dr Saskia Bonjour. Questions discussed included:

• In your jurisdiction, who counts as “family” according to your immigration rules? Does it reflect contemporary societal understandings of “family”?

• How are the best interests of the child protected in practice in your respective jurisdictions?

• In the UK, a “financial requirement” aims to ensure that migrants coming on a family visa do not represent a burden on public finances. Do family migration policies pursue a similar objective in your respective jurisdictions? If so, how is it achieved and to what effect?

• What are the main criticisms of family migration policies in your respective jurisdictions? How do they compare with those in the UK (family separation, delays, costs, complexity, need for and availability of legal advice, etc.)?

• Seen from outside the UK, what is the most noteworthy feature of UK family migration policies?

Further information and a link to the recording of the session can be found via this link.