These provisions in fact very rarely cause any difficulties. Passengers who have been aware for less than 2 years and who are returning to live here are normally admitted without any further enquiry and instructions have been issued to Immigration Officers emphasising that the practice should continue.
It also remains the case that a person who does not qualify under paragraph 58 of the Rules may nevertheless be admitted as a returning resident under paragraph 59 if, for example, he has lived here for most of his life. Moreover a passenger unhappy about being given limited leave to enter can apply after entry for indefinite leave to be restored and would have a right of appeal against refusal. It is of course then necessary for the applicant to remain in the UK long enough for the claim to be considered but we would not expect that to cause any difficulty for those who are genuinely resident here.
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Turning now to Mr Au Yeung's case, I understand that he arrived the United Kingdom on 12 June 1990. He was asked a few standard questions of the type put to all arriving passengers to establish the basis on which he was seeking admission. He told the Immigration Officer that he intended to visit his sister; that he had 2 weeks leave from his employment as a civil engineer in Hong Kong; and that he had a return ticket. The Immigration Officer accordingly granted Mr Au Yeung leave to enter as a visitor for six months. In the event he returned to Hong Kong after 8 days here.
Mr Au Yeung has not lived in the United Kingdom since 1980. He said that he was seeking admission only for a short visit and had no intention of resuming residence in the UK. He thus could not qualify as a returning resident. Mr Au Yeung did not apply for variation of his leave during his short stay in the United Kingdom; his stay was in any event too short for such an application to have been considered and it would have lapsed when he left the United Kingdom on 20 June.
To put all this into perspective, I should perhaps mention that in 1987, 1988 and 1989 respectively, 2,200, 2,600 and 3,500 British Dependent Territories Citizens from Hong Kong were admitted to the UK as returning residents. The figure for the 3 months following the implementation of the new Rules Change on 1 May was 1,000, very much in line with the increases seen in earlier years, suggesting that there has indeed been substantive change in policy or practice.
Kind regards
no
Ron Arculli Esq
PETER LLOYD
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