Plans for a £3,000 "security bond" for some "high
risk" overseas visitors to the UK are to be
abandoned, the Home Office has confirmed.
The visa bond scheme was announced by Home
Secretary Theresa May in June and was set to be
introduced this month.
A Home Office spokesman confirmed a Sunday
Times report that the policy would be scrapped.
The decision is thought to have been taken after
deputy prime minister Nick Clegg threatened to
block it.
The aim of the scheme was to reduce the number of
people from some "high risk" countries - including
India, Pakistan, and Nigeria - staying in the UK
once their short-term visas had expired.
Visitors would have paid a £3,000 cash bond
before arrival in the UK - forfeited if they failed
make the return trip.
'Outrage'
The idea was first suggested by Mr Clegg in March.
But Business Secretary Vince Cable later claimed
the deputy prime minister's plan, which had
suggested a bond of £1,000, had been deliberately
misinterpreted by some of their Conservative
cabinet colleagues.
"What Nick Clegg said was if somebody in the
Indian sub-continent, for example, was turned
down for a visa, they could, as an alternative,
come up with a bond... But the way some of our
colleagues interpreted was in a much more
negative way, of saying that everybody who comes
here should pay this very large bond," Mr Cable
said in September.
Mr Cable also criticised the level at which the bond
was set and said that it had caused "outrage" in
India.
He said both he and Nick Clegg would be arguing in
government for a "much more sensible and
flexible" approach to the policy.
The idea was also floated several times by the
previous Labour government but never
implemented.
The announcement comes two weeks after a roll
out of Home Office vans with posters warning
illegal immigrants to "go home or face arrest" was
cancelled.
Mrs May told MPs she accepted they had "not been
a good idea" and were too much of a "blunt
instrument".

Source: http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24793092