Craig Whittaker – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Craig Whittaker on 2016-09-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many convictions there have been for offences relating to cases of immigration marriage fraud in each of the last 10 years.
Mr Robert Goodwill
The table below gives the number of individuals who were successfully prosecuted by Home Office Immigration Enforcement for offences relating to immigration marriage fraud.
|
Year |
Successfully prosecuted |
|
2014/15 |
121 |
|
2015/16 |
37 |
Prior to 2014, the records were not held centrally.
The decrease in the number of referrals to the Home Office can be aligned to the introduction of the Immigration Act 2014.
This legislation extends the notification period for those seeking to marry up to 70 days and provides time for the Home Office to investigate whether the marriage is sham. The effect of this is that those marriages deemed to be sham can be prevented from taking place.
