LaurentLore
October 2019
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Testimonial

I made a right decision choosing your firm "I appreciate your clarity you give to your clients through your emails. From my bottom of my heart I wish you a good and prosperous future. I confirm I made a right decision choosing your firm and lucky having you as our representative."  

Madhavi

Laurent Law Barristers & Solicitors
7A Maidstone Street, Grey Lynn, Auckland, 1021, New Zealand
Ph.  +64-9-630-0411;  Fax  +64-9-630-0412


Laurent Law on the Move
 
In an ever changing world it is inevitable that the needs of a business will change. As part of the process of positioning ourselves in the market we must continuously ensure that we have the right people, service and the best location to reach our client base. We are confident that we have the right people and service on offer, but we realised that our office space needed to change. To accommodate what we want to achieve we made the decision to move our office closer to the city.

Our new address is 7A Maidstone Street, Grey Lynn, Auckland. Our contact numbers and email addresses have stayed the same. We are very accessible and trust that we have made it easier for you to connect with us. We have off-street parking on offer and our central location makes it easy to reach us by public transport.
 
We are very excited about our new location and look forward to meeting with you to discuss your immigration needs.

We continue to highlight current issues in our  law firm blog Subscribe to the blog in order to see up-to-date commentary on trends in the immigration field.

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Yours sincerely
Simon Laurent
LaurentLaw Barristers & Solicitors
Email Me   and please add this email address to your Contact List
Your comments would be appreciated - including questions which you would like answered directly or in a future instalment.
Parent Residence Visas are Back
 
Since October 2016, Immigration suspended selections of Expressions of Interest (EOIs) from the Parent Residence pool.  Last week, the Minister of Immigration announced that the category will reopen in February 2020.
 

 

The key change - and the one causing the most unhappiness in the community - is the new income requirements for New Zealand children.  A single sponsor wishing to support one parent for Residence must earn about $106K per year, or twice the national median wage of $53K.  A sponsor and partner who wish to combine their income to support 2 parents must earn $212K.  In addition, they must prove that they have earned at this level for 2 out of the last 3 years.

 

Those who still have EOIs have been invited to check if they will qualify.  If they do not, then they can apply for a refund of the fee they paid.  No allowance has been made, and no interim policy put in place, for those who have waited in vain for several years to find out if they can bring their parents over.

 

It is not surprising that the new scheme is being labelled as "elitist" and "just for the rich".  By definition, most people who want to bring their parents over got their own Residence through the Skilled Migrant Category (SMC).  In order to qualify, they must be paid at around the median wage, which was set at $52K per year at the end of 2018.  While a number of SMC Residents do earn more than that, there is a big gap between this threshold and the income required to bring in just one parent.  If they want to bring both parents (and most would want to do that), then they must earn at least 3 times the median.

 

The Government has set a cap of 1000 places per year for this Parent policy.  Combined with the salary requirements, it is clearly only within the reach of a relatively few people.

 

The detailed policy has not been published, and probably has not yet been written.  There are some unresolved questions: For example, if you apply for Residence for one parent only, and then later apply for the other parent separately, which salary threshold applies, and from when?  We suspect that there will be a lot more talk about this scheme, and its social effects, both before and after it gets underway.

 

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