Immigration newsletter 27 Dec 2007

The Schengen Zone now encompasses a vast, visa-free area for 400 million people throughout 24 European countries. It is now possible to travel over 4,000 km (2,485 miles), from Tallinn in Estonia to Lisbon in Portugal, without encountering any border controls. Nine new countries joined the agreement as of 21 December 2007. For now, the scrapping of border controls will involve only land and sea borders. But, at the end of March 2008, it will be expanded to airports. 

Switzerland will become the 25th Schengen country when it joins next year. Cyprus, which also joined the European Union in 2004, has asked for a one year delay. Romania and Bulgaria, having just become EU members on 01 January 2007, will take some more time. The European Commission has invested about one billion Euros (?720m) on increasing security along the new EU frontiers. 

The Schengen Information Service (SIS) features an enormous database in Strasbourg, France. The SIS database lets police in any Schengen state find out whether a suspect has been involved in any kind of crime in any other Schengen country. The database also includes a lot of data from countries that are not Schengen signatories. 

The Executive Director of Frontex, Ilkka Laitinen, said European countries were well aware of the potential security problems, but that "it is a deliberate choice of the European Union to focus more on the free movement of persons than on security aspects."

The Ernst & Young ITEM Club, a think tank based in the United Kingdom, has published a study entitled 'Migration and the UK Economy.' It analyzes the economic impact of immigration into the UK during the last decade. According to the report, ITEM found that the nation could suffer a decline in eonomic growth if the flow of foreign labor drops off. 

If immigration were to continue to increase at the same rate seen over the past two years, ITEM projects GDP growth to be an impressive 3% per year for another next decade. However, if immigration remains in line with the average of the last decade, long-term trend growth would be reduced to 2.4% per year. If immigration were to halt completely, growth would drop to just 2.2% per year. 

Approximately one-third of immigrants in the last three years have come from the new European Union member states that joined in May 2004 and after. The ITEM Club report finds that the UK economy requires the current immigration rate to increase because the native-born pool of working age citizens is growing more slowly than the pensioner population. 

The Australian Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Chris Evans, announced on 23 December that Dr. Mohammed Haneef's temporary 457 visa would be restored, following a Federal Court decision. Dr. Haneef's visa was revoked by the former Immigration Minister, Kevin Andrews, in connection with the investigation into the failed bombing attacks in the United Kingdom in June 2007. Haneef's visa is now valid until 2010. 

At the time of the incident, Dr. Haneef was in Australia under a 457 work visa. He was arrested and charged with supplying the bombing suspects in the UK with a mobile phone SIM card when Dr. Haneef left the UK for Australia. However, the charge was later dropped. Andrews used wording in the current Australian Migration Act to revoke Dr. Haneef's visa, stating that his connection with the men meant that Haneef failed the character test, which is one of the requirements for an immigrant to be able to live and work in Australia. 

An Australian Federal Court decided that Andrews had applied an interpretation of the law that was too wide. The court ruled that to fail the character test, a person would have to be sympathetic to, or more directly support, or be more directly involved in the criminal conduct of those involved.

Canadian Parliamentary Secretary, Ed Komarnicki, has announced a plan to support Saskatchewan in its effort to attract immigrants. Speaking on behalf of Diane Finley, Minister of Immigration and Citizenship, Komarnicki said CAD $660,000 in funding would be allocated to the Canadian province over a three year period. 

The money will be used to enhance online content, tools, and services that will assist migrants in integrating into the community and promote Saskatchewan as an attractive destination. Saskatchewan is not the only province to benefit from federal immigration funding. 

The Canadian government is providing a total of CAD $20.3 million for provinces and territories to enhance online information and services about settling and working in Canada. The federal government is investing more than CAD $1.4 billion over five years in settlement funding to help immigrants adjust to their new life in Canada, including services which help migrants to get their foreign credentials recognized by Canadian employers.