Immigration news

The US Congress has announced that it will vote in June on the immigration reform bill prepared by the so-called 'Gang of Eight'.

The Gang of Eight is made up of four Republicans and four Democrats who have been working on the bill since January. The Republicans include the former Presidential candidate John McCain and the youthful darling of the right Marco Rubio who, many believe, will challenge for the presidency in 2016. The Democrats include veteran New York senator Chuck Schumer and Dick Durbin of Illinois.

The population of Spain has fallen for the first time since records began according to the Spanish National Statistics Institute. The latest figures show that the population of Spanish citizens grew very slightly by 10,000 people but the number of registered foreign residents fell by 216,000 resulting in a net population fall of 206,000 to 47.1m.

A group of US senators has released the draft Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013 (The Act). The Act was drafted by the Gang of Eight; a group of eight senators, four Republicans and four Democrats, and contains proposals for comprehensive reform of the entire US immigration system.

Diane Abbott, the UK's first black woman MP and now a Labour shadow minister, has warned the leadership of her party not to try to compete with other UK parties by promising to be 'tough' on immigration. This year, the Labour Party leader Ed Miliband has made two speeches on immigration. He has said that the last Labour government 'got it wrong' on immigration and has said that the Party will act to limit unskilled migration if it is re-elected.

Mark Harper, the UK's immigration minister, has said that the UK's university sector has continued to attract 'the brightest and the best' international students and has not been harmed by changes to the Tier 4 visa system carried out by UK immigration authorities.

Mr Harper was speaking to The Pie, an online educational magazine. He said 'We are not harming genuine students. More university students are coming here and bogus students are being kept out. There is no limit on the number of students who can come to the UK.'

A Canadian judge has ruled that the country's immigration minister, Jason Kenney, did not break the law when he terminated applications for permanent residence visas from some 280,000 applicants in July 2012. On Thursday 18th April 2013, Justice Donald Rennie said that he understood that those affected would see Mr Kenney's act as 'unfair, arbitrary and unnecessary' but said that it was not illegal and so he had no powers to overturn it.