New Zealand Visa Bureau » News » NZ overturns third of residency decisions

14 August 2006

NZ overturns third of residency decisions

Appeals against New Zealand's Immigration service have seen almost a third of decisions reversed over the past year.

Immigration New Zealand made the wrong judgement in about a third of cases where people appealed against being denied residency, the Residence Review Board says.

The board said in its annual report to June that it received 372 appeals in the year compared to 408 in 2004-05.

It tackled a backlog of outstanding appeals and said it was getting decisions out faster.

It made 635 decisions in the year, and of these 56 per cent (356) of appeals were dismissed. Another 279 (44 per cent) of appeals were successful in one way or another.

The successful appeals included 227 (36 per cent) where the Immigration Service "was incorrect".