Immigration, Asylum and Free Movement

Our immigration, asylum, and free movement team have been involved in a number of ground-breaking disputes, from cases before the Court of Justice of the European Union, European Court of Human Rights, and challenges contributing to the development of the law in the UK Supreme Court. We have experience dealing with sensitive claims, including those in the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC). We also act for commercial organisations and assist with business immigration issues involved in recruiting individuals from overseas.

Our members are able to draw upon their expertise of international law, EU free movement regimes, international humanitarian law and extradition and mutual assistance.

Leading experts

Our experts have appeared in almost 30 cases before the UK Supreme Court or House of Lords. We are instructed in cases in the BVI and Cayman Islands and currently instructed in FV (Italy) before the UK Supreme Court concerning the ‘enhanced protection’ test under the EU Citizen’s Directive, and appeared before the Grand Chamber of the ECtHR in Tarakhel v Switzerland App No. 29217/12, concerning the approach to transfers under the Dublin II Regulation, which regulates applications for international protection by asylum seekers.

We acted in ZZ v UK C-300/11 before the CJEU, a case concerning whether the approach adopted by SIAC was compliant with the fundamental principles of EU law. We have also been involved in RN (Sri Lanka) v SSHD [2014] EWCA Civ 938, concerning the application of an ECHR decision to domestic immigration cases.