SMP members invited to feed into UK Visas inquiry

The SMP provides the Secretariat for the UK Parliament’s All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Malawi. The next meeting of this Group is a joint meeting with the Africa APPG, and will be addressed by the UK Government’s Immigration Minister, Rt Hon Caroline Nokes MP. The meeting will look to present some of challenges organisations across the UK have experienced with UK visa issuing for those travelling from Africa.

The meeting itself, on the 13th February, is only open to Parliamentarians and officials. However, key stakeholders, including all members of the SMP, are invited to feed in their views and experiences relating to the issuing of UK visas in advance of the meeting, to inform the all-party policy briefing presented to the Minister. Those submitting written evidence may be invited to present their experience, if they wish, to MPs and Peers on the 22nd January.

If you would like to share your experiences of applying for or supporting a UK visa application from Malawi, please submit a written statement of up to 1500 words, in MS Word format, and email to baileyh(at)parliament.uk and david(at)scotland-malawipartnership.org no later than Tuesday 8th January.

The session on the 22nd January hopes to gather evidence and information from participants on the following questions:

1) What is your experience of supporting African national applying for visas for African nationals to conferences / events / training sessions in the UK?

2) How many times have you supported African nationals to apply for a UK visa, of whatever type?

3) How many were rejected or approved? What were the most common grounds for refusal given?

4) For those that reapplied, how many were granted visas? What circumstances changed in their application? Did they resubmit with additional information?

6) Have you seen any evidence of inconsistency in decision-making regarding visa applications?

7) What do you understand to be the main barriers to submitting successful visa applications for African nationals?

For more information, please contact david(at)scotland-malawipartnership.org