Changes made to immigration law

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Amendments made to the Equality Act 2010 will allow selected individuals from Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and the United States of America, to register as ‘Registered Travellers’. This came into effect on September 24th 2013.

If selected for this scheme, the individual will be processed faster at the border. They will be processed similarly to EEA nationals, the difference being that they will be processed under the Immigration Regulation and not the EEA Regulation. Another benefit of the Registered Travellers scheme is the ability to gain access to faster moving queues than the standard one used by non-EEA nationals before reaching the PCP.

To be eligible for the Registered Travellers scheme you must be:

• A national of one of the countries mentioned above
• A frequent traveller into the UK at least four times a year
• Registered for the iris immigration registration system (IRIS)
• Coming to the UK as a visitor
• Over 18

The countries which have been selected for this scheme are on the basis of low risk and high volume. Low risk meaning reduced levels of social, physical and economic harm to the UK; high volume meaning they visit the UK most regularly. Other low risk countries were considered, but the scheme emphasises on countries that travel into the UK in high volumes, thus restricting the accesses of the scheme at this initial stage.

This scheme is being piloted at Heathrow and Gatwick airports, before being released across the UK.

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