will be kept under careful review and if there is some significant movement in the policy of the Vietnamese government and a substantial proportion of the 1500 people in respect of whom visas have been authorised are allowed to travel we will start processing other applications.
This policy is partly to ensure that our limited staff resources are directed towards cases where there is some prospect of a positive result in the foreseeable future. Also because, if the Vietnamese government's policy were to change, the outstanding cases would be more than enough to cope with for a while and it would be arousing false expectations to pile up an unlimited number of family reunion visa authorisations.
We have
1000 applications in the queue. Those in respect of whom enquiries have already been started will be continued to a conclusion, though without priority. The remainder will not be processed under present conditions.
CONCLUSION
Voluntary organisations will not wish to censor applications. It would however be helpful, both to the Home Office and to avoid arousing false expectations, if they could discourage applications which clearly have no prospect of favourable consideration.
J