Overview

Jo has recently completed an ESRC funded PhD at the University of Exeter, exploring the legal geographies of immigration bail. Using ethnographies of tribunal hearings and interviews with their key actors, she examined the nature of space and technology in immigration bail hearings. 

Jo is currently a Senior Researcher at Public Law Project, a charity engaged in research and strategic litigation across a range of public law issues, including immigration and civil legal aid. Her research here focuses on immigration policy, legal aid and related access to justice issues, as well as the role of digitalisation in the justice system. 

PhD title: Legal Geographies of Immigration Bail: Space, Technology & Remote Hearings.

Broad research specialisms:

Jo's work is situated in the fields of legal geography and socio-legal studies. Her work focuses on legal and geographical imaginations of space, access to justice and courtwatching methodologies. She is particularly interested in interdisciplinary research and partnership working across academia, civil society and grassroots organisations.

Find me on Twitter or LinkedIn.

Qualifications

BA Geography (University of Oxford)

MSc Global Migration (University College London)

PhD Human Geography (Univeristy of Exeter) 

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Research

Research projects

Research Reports

• Public Law Project, Bail for Immigration Detainees & Medical Justice (2023) ‘Constantly on edge’: The expansion of GPS tagging and the rollout of non-fitted devices. Full report.

• Public Law Project & Young Legal Aid Lawyers (2023) Overstretched & unsustainable: a case study of the immigration and asylum legal aid sector. Full report.

• Public Law Project, Bail for Immigration Detainees & Medical Justice (2022) Every Move You Make: The Human Cost of GPS Tagging in the Immigration System. Full report.

• Public Law Project (2021) Public Law Project roundtable: Preventing exclusion in an age of digitalisation. Full report.

• Public Law Project (May 2021) Digital Support for HMCTS Reformed Services: What we know and what we need to know. Full report.

• Public Law Project (August 2020) Online Immigration Appeals: A Case Study of the First-tier Tribunal. Full report.

• Public Law Project (April 2020) Judicial Review during COVID-19. Full report.

Blog pieces

• Free Movement, 11/04/23: Two ways to address the asylum backlog and improve access to justice. Full text.

• Legal Action Group Magazine, June 2022: GPS tagging as an immigration bail condition – what’s changed and why are we concerned? Full text.

• Legal Action Group Magazine, March 2022: New HMCTS evaluation of remote hearings. Full text.

• UKAJI , 29/07/21: Preventing exclusion in an age of digitalisation. Full text.

• Legal Action Group Magazine, May 2021. Digital exclusion and HMCTS reformed services. Full text.

• Free Movement, 17/12/20: New research: 34 ways to improve asylum appeals. Full text.

• Legal Action Group Magazine, September 2020. Remote Hearings in the Immigration Tribunal. Full text.

• Law Society Gazette, 26/08/20: PLP research reveals challenges of online immigration appeals. Full text.

• Admin Law Blog, May 2020: Judicial Review during the COVID-19 Pandemic (Part I) & (Part ll). Full text. 

• Free Movement, 01/07/20: Research interviews reveal crippling impact of new legal aid rules. Full text.

• Free Movement, 27/03/20: Remote hearings in the immigration tribunal: what could possibly go wrong? Full text.

• UKAJI, 06/05/19: “Hello Dungavel!”: observations on the use of video link technology in immigration bail hearings. Full text.

Miscellaneous

•  Submission to the House of Lords Constitution Committee enquiry, Constitutional Implications of COVID-19. Full text. 

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