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Which country are you in when you are on a plane?
This is probably a long shot (and somewhat tongue in cheek )but I would be grateful for any thoughts.
My client has had to reapply for various benefits because she was out of the country on holiday for one day longer than allowed and the claims were ended. She had to be back in the UK on 16.03.11 to fall within the time limit and although she boarded the plane in South Africa on the 16th it was the 17th before she arrived back in the UK. It was a British registered aircraft operated by a British airline so was she in fact on British territory on the 16th?
Off the top of my head I wouldn’t have thought so as a British plane is a private entity and not part of the crown so, officially, not British territory. Interesting question and I lokok forward to some more authoratative replies than mine.
Taking the argument to extremes, going by boat could take several days, it would be odd if you could count as present in GB from the moment you cast off?
R(S)1/66 suggests the day you land is when presence starts.
Thanks for both replies,very helpful.
On a slightly more abstact note if you are not in GB when you are on a plane or boat then whose jurisdiction are you under? I only ask because back in the early 90s I was on a Ryanair plane returning from Romania and several fellow passengers were Eire citizens returning to Eire with Romanian babies they had legaly adopted in Romania. We were told that they could not leave the plane at Heathrow while waiting for the flight to continue to Eire as although Romania and Eire recognised the adoption process the UK government did not and they were liable to be arrested as soon as they were on British soil. They were apparently only safe from arrest as the plane was considered to be under the jurisdiction of the Eire law - this may of course have all been nonsense but they certainly seemed to be taking it seriously. I got off at Heathrow so I don’t know what happened next.
The definition of “abroad” will come from benefits law, not aviation law. My suspicion is that it will mean “outside the geographical borders of the country”. (I base this upon a rather old crisis loan decision regarding help for travelling to ill relatives abroad. There may be a more up to date decision.)