6. Memorandum submitted by
Brent Registrar
1. I am Mark Rimmer, of Brent Town Hall,
Forty Lane, Wembley, Middlesex. I am Service Director/Superintendent
Registrar at the London Borough of Brent. I have held this position
since January 1988. I have overall responsibility for management
of the unit but have specific responsibility for the legal preliminaries
to marriage, conducting of civil marriage ceremonies in premises
licensed for the purpose within the Borough, the storage of historic
records of births, deaths and marriages and the issue of certified
copies from those records on demand from any person that requires
legal evidence that a specific event has taken place.
2. My statement is intended to describe:
(a) My experience of the difficulties facing
Registrars presented with marriages intended to circumvent immigration
controls prior to the coming into force of the new rules governing
marriage where one or both parties are subject to immigration
control introduced by the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of
Claimants etc.) Act 2004 ("the 2004 Act");
(b) The effect of the implementation of the new
rules under the 2004 Act.
3. From the time I took up my position in Brent
in 1988, I recognised that there was a significant problem with
marriages arranged purely for the avoidance of immigration controls.
I became increasingly frustrated by the lack of any legal powers
to enable me to prevent such marriages taking place.
4. In many of these cases, the purpose of the
marriage was clear and often the parties made no attempt to conceal
the fact that the marriage was being entered into to circumvent
the immigration rules. Some illegal entrants were, for example,
happy to admit that they had entered the country illegally and
were marrying EEA nationals in order to remain in the UK.
5. Couples very often were unable to converse
in the same language and required an interpreter to enable them
to communicate with each other. Large age gaps or significant
cultural differences between the parties—such as a young
Muslim male marrying a much older Catholic female—would
cause me to be suspicious, even in a Borough like Brent which
has one of the most culturally diverse populations in Europe.
Such factors alone might not give rise to suspicion, but when
combined with the fact that the couple appeared to know very little
about each other and one was a foreign national subject to immigration
control would lead me to question the motives for the marriage.
6. As a registrar, the only power I had when
confronted with blatant abuse of the system was to report my suspicions
to the Registrar General. If the Registrar General considered
the reasons to be sufficiently compelling, he or she might then
refer those concerns to the Immigration Service. From my perspective
in the registration service, nothing appeared to happen as a result
of these reports. As a result, many registrars often did not bother
to pursue what they perceived to be a futile exercise. In any
event, the marriages would proceed and registrars became increasingly
frustrated with the system.
7. However, as a result of these problems changes
were made to the registration process with effect from the beginning
of 2001. Prior to this date there were two ways in which notice
of marriage could be given. The Certificate without licence provision
required 21 clear days notice and the certificate and licence
provision enabled couples to be married after one clear day. In
both cases only one party to the marriage had to attend to give
notice of marriage and give information on behalf of both. The
certificate and licence provision which was often used by those
seeking to abuse the system, due to the speed which with the marriage
could be arranged, was abolished. The waiting time for the certificate
without licence provision was reduced to 15 clear days but both
parties to a marriage were required to give notice separately
and make independent legal statements about their capacity to
marry.
8. From that time, registrars were also obliged
by statute to report suspicious marriages direct to the Immigration
Service. Registrars were also encouraged to request evidence of
the address of residence of both parties at the time he or she
gave notice of the intention to marry, although they were given
no legal powers to demand such evidence.
9. Unfortunately, however, these changes made
little difference to the abuse of the system. I would estimate,
from my personal experience, the extent of the problem in Brent
between 2001 and the implementation of the 2004 Act provisions
in February 2005 to be that approximately 20% of all the marriages
were sham (by which I mean that they were entered into purely
in order to obtain more advantageous immigration status). That
equated to approximately 250 marriages a year in one London Borough
alone. The total number of marriages being solemnised in Brent
at that time was in the region of 1,300 per annum and I was personally
responsible for performing approximately 450. During regular staff
meetings with my colleagues I was advised that they were also
experiencing a similar rate of sham marriages.
10. In late 2003, early 2004 the incidence of
abusive marriages increased dramatically, particularly within
London and the Home Counties. I am the registration service secondee
to LACORS (Local Authority Co-Ordinators of Regulatory Services)
and have specific responsibility for the bogus marriage issue.
In this role I received specific verbal intelligence from officers
around the country. Colleagues from many districts in the South
East were being inundated with parties to intended marriages whom
they considered to have suspicious motives and many were finding
it difficult to cope with the numbers of people wishing to get
married.
11. In some London Boroughs, notably Haringey,
anecdotal reports from staff were that up to 50% of marriages
taking place there were considered to be for the purpose of circumventing
immigration control.
12. In Brent there was an increasing trend, from
my own observation and experience, where one party was a foreign
national subject to immigration control, and the other was a national
of a country from within the EEA (primarily France, Holland, Portugal
and Belgium), for the couple to provide utility bills and bank
statements as evidence of address. On discussing this phenomenon
with a colleague in Westminster I discovered that a similar trend
had emerged there also.
13. This led to a comparison by me and Alison
Cathcart, the superintendent registrar of Westminster City Council,
of the evidence of address produced by different couples in both
Westminster and Brent and as a result we discovered that a number
of the bank statements listed identical transactions and balances.
The only difference between the documents was the name recorded
as account holder. The same thing was discovered in relation to
utility bills.
14. Subsequently, a significant file of such
documents was compiled, all of which were discovered to be forgeries.
At meetings of London registration managers in December 2003 it
became apparent that the majority of districts were receiving
similar documents as evidence of address.
15. LACORS, the local authority co-ordinating
body with overall responsibility for the registration service,
wrote on 18 February 2004 to the Minister for Immigration setting
out the concerns expressed by registrars, not only in London but
also in the Home Counties and other areas of a high degree of
ethnic diversity.
16. At this time there was also some media coverage
highlighting the scale of the bogus marriage problem. In response
the Government established the Bogus Marriage Task Force which
included representatives from the Immigration Service, local government,
the registration service and Home Office policy staff.
17. The solution devised as a result was a new
scheme to govern marriages where one or both parties to a marriage
is subject to immigration control as set out in the guidance and
regulations created pursuant to section 19 of the 2004 Act.
18. Amongst these requirements was a requirement
for notice to be given by both persons attending together at one
of 76 Designated Register Offices set up in England and Wales.
In limiting the number of offices the intention was that staff
would build up expertise in dealing with notices given by foreign
nationals and would have ready access to and experience working
with local immigration enforcement offices. A sufficient number
of Register Offices were designated for it not to impose any great
inconvenience: for example in London 28 of the 32 Borough offices
are designated. The provisions came into force in February 2005
and were, I believe, universally welcomed by registrars and local
authorities throughout the country.
19. In Brent we have experienced a drop the overall
number of marriages taking place of over 50% since these provisions
came into force. This has also been the experience in many other
London Boroughs based on my discussions with colleagues at a meeting
of London Registration Managers, which I now chair, in December
2005.
Mark Rimmer
Service Director/Superintendent Registrar
London Borough of Brent
3 February 2006
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