"I have never welcomed the weakening of family ties by politics or pressure" - Nelson Mandela.
"He who travels for love finds a thousand miles no longer than one" - Japanese proverb.
"Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence." - Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
"When people's love is divided by law, it is the law that needs to change". - David Cameron.
Thank you all so much for the work you do!! Would love to share our story with you someday. We had planned on moving back to the UK to raise our family there and as a base for our businesses, until at immigration in Inverness I was updated on the changes to the spousal visa. Now we are back in Thailand ( where we had lived before our journey to Scotland) and in total limbo.
ReplyDeleteHello, thanks for sharing your story and good luck! Please do keep following and also keep joining the relevant Facebook and other support groups that we publicise from time to time to keep abreast of the campaign. In particular jcwi.org.uk and migrantsrights.org.uk. All the best to you and merry Christmas.
DeleteI think some of your information may be incorrect. If the children and British (by descent or otherwise) then they are not included in the financial requirement, just the spouse. Correct? You should probably outline this.
ReplyDeleteIf the children are British citizens, then you are correct (generally the additional requirements are for stepchildren). I'll reword it slightly to make it clearer. Thanks for pointing it out.
DeleteThanks Steven! :)
DeleteMe and my fiancee, who by the way is a British citizen, are currently living in South Africa, my home country. We would love to move back to the UK, where I have worked before, but with the new income threshold of £18 600 and the very bad Rand to £ exchange rate, it seems almost impossible for us to do so.
ReplyDeletebeen with my husband 5 yrs married 2 we applied for a spouse visa in 2012 to be put on hold we have took our visa off hold and asked for my husbands passport back 28th may2014 we are still waiting for this now 1 month on ( we applied on tunis) why do we have to wait we paid for the visa and they will keep this money all we want is passport back and wedding photos and all paper work. we have e mailed and phoned but nothing can anyone help xxxxx
ReplyDeleteGood cause.
ReplyDeletehttp://hnhnorfolk.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/the-forgotten-would-be-immigrants.html
I get 28.500 a year and girlfriend and baby boy are living in Thailand as she cannot go back her country (laos) as she as a baby with a unmarried man. She as to pass a English test before she comes here but were does she get the time study with a 1 year baby who as a British passport.
ReplyDeleteTheresa May introduced these new rules to give the illusion that the government is reducing immigration, but really they are just using easy targets. I did not know that there was a price on falling inlove...
ReplyDeleteMy engagement broke down because of these precise rules, as I committed the crime of falling inlove with someone from another country. It would have been hard for me live in his country as my profession is basically useless there, and I do not speak the language. We hoped to live in my country, but the salary requirement has prevented that. I have tried to get a higher paid job to support us, but the job market is hard for everyone at the moment. After almost a year of waiting and months apart, it exhausted us emotionally and I realised it just wasn't fair on either of us anymore.
These rules actually make it easier for sham marriages and male order brides, and makes a hellish time for genuine applicants.
Hello what support groups do you have on FB. Also is there anyone that has gotten a job offer and gone that route. I am in the US and am in the process of working up the funds to go through a lawyer to the UK. Have many had more joy that way???
ReplyDeleteThanks
This is the most popular Facebook group - 'I Love My Foreign Spouse' : https://www.facebook.com/groups/139807999382936/
DeleteYou would do well to sign up there as it might be good to talk to people who have gone through this recently.
I'm afraid that it is not just people earning under the minimum threshold (£18,600) that are being affected. I earn over £35,000 with savings, own a home and have a good job. However, my wife's visa was rejected by the British High Commission in India for the most spurious reason.
ReplyDeleteWe have now been apart for over one year and the appeal process could drag on for many more months. It is heartbreaking. I wanted to start a business and family in my home country of the UK but am being put in the position of having to consider emigrating so that we can be together. I am so ashamed of this misguided policy and my own country's government!
I'm afraid that it is not just people earning under the minimum threshold (£18,600) that are being affected. I earn over £35,000 with savings, own a home and have a good job. However, my wife's visa was rejected by the British High Commission in India for the most spurious reason.
ReplyDeleteWe have now been apart for over one year and the appeal process could drag on for many more months. It is heartbreaking. I wanted to start a business and family in my home country of the UK but am being put in the position of having to consider emigrating so that we can be together. I am so ashamed of this misguided policy and my own country's government!
Hi William
DeleteI find that them refusing your wife's visa to be refused to be strange especially that you have all the required criteria. I mean my story is that I have had this battle with immigration for nearly five years but before I didn't have the relevant criteria. Now that I do I a little apprehensive about applying.
Please don't let my case put you off. However, my advice would be to get a good immigration lawyer to help put together your application and evidence documentation. You need to be really thorough and not give them any excuse for a refusal. However, sometimes the entry clearance officer just makes a poor decision as with my wife's application. Best of luck.
DeleteI am a 59 year old teacher living in Pakistan with my Pakistani wife. The state has outlawed marriages to foreign males (not the other way round). We have been married for 25 years and I am a British Citizen. My income level is well below £18,600 per year as the exchange rate is 158 rupees to the pound sterling. We have hardly any savings. Enough in fact for just two air fares. I earn £850 a month. Even the Surinder Singh route is too expensive and next year I will have to work on less pay and a yearly contract due to my age.
ReplyDeleteI keep reading that this and that is being judged in court but what is changing ANYTHING
ReplyDeleteCriminals flout the law, but the rest of us follow rules laid down.
BUT enough is enough remove laws that go against basic human rights to be together with loved ones.
I am a 27 year old British man married to an American, we desperately want to move home to the UK as the cost of living where we are is just unbelievable, not to mention the fact that we are expecting our first child and my father has multiple sclerosis and can't travel here ever. Under these criminal laws we are stuck here. I served in the British army previously and feel disgusted to be British given it is my country that does this to its own and other people.
ReplyDeletePlease sign this petition and let's bring this issue in front of the commons for debate. I'm in a similar position to you all, raising my baby alone as a forced single parent while my partner was refused entry to see our baby born. Every single day is a struggle just to get by with the feelings of loss and hopelessness.
ReplyDeleteReconsider the 2012 immigration rules for spouse visas.
Why is this important?
Following a change in immigration rules in 2012, a valid, genuine, and even long-standing marriage to a British citizen is no longer considered grounds to allow families to live together in the UK. Nor is having children who are British citizens.
Reconsider this discriminatory law which keeps families apart.
Allow the same rights for British citizens as the government recognises for European citizens, who can live in the UK with non-EU spouses. Citizens of all of the EU countries, as well as Switzerland, can live and work in the UK with a spouse and/or children from anywhere in the world. This right is denied by the UK to its own citizens.
It is time for the Home Office to rethink this law, and allow the families of British citizens to live together.
Sign and share
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/121216
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/121216
Please sign this petition and let's bring this issue in front of the commons for debate. I'm in a similar position to you all, raising my baby alone as a forced single parent while my partner was refused entry to see our baby born. Every single day is a struggle just to get by with the feelings of loss and hopelessness.
ReplyDeleteReconsider the 2012 immigration rules for spouse visas.
Why is this important?
Following a change in immigration rules in 2012, a valid, genuine, and even long-standing marriage to a British citizen is no longer considered grounds to allow families to live together in the UK. Nor is having children who are British citizens.
Reconsider this discriminatory law which keeps families apart.
Allow the same rights for British citizens as the government recognises for European citizens, who can live in the UK with non-EU spouses. Citizens of all of the EU countries, as well as Switzerland, can live and work in the UK with a spouse and/or children from anywhere in the world. This right is denied by the UK to its own citizens.
It is time for the Home Office to rethink this law, and allow the families of British citizens to live together.
Sign and share
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/121216
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/121216
hi everyone
ReplyDeleteI'm an Albanian girl married with a British husband. Being six months away from each other and being denied the really expensive visa and stuff we suffer in distance...I've been refused the visa on the excuse we aren't genuine couple for gods sake but no one checked nor interviewed us and they had many many proofs of the opposite. Plus I lived in the uk for three years illegally and when met my husband we spend a year together then decided to come in Albania to get married as we had no right to do so there. After we left together with our own will and I wasn't deported nor in any trouble,they said I didn't show remorse about being illegal in my application. Wasn't remorse enough the fact that I left to make things right?! Now we haven't got the right to be together even if we are ok in our requirements?!? God...I see there are so many people like us...how can our voices be heard guys?!? Why another Europe citizen has every right in the uk but not the English people themselves?!? This is absurd:( please help us....
Regards ,Alice xo
I guess no suggestions whatsoever...(?)
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHello Everyone,
ReplyDeleteMy name is Brian, US Citizen, I am married to my husband Ben, British Citizen, of 2 years. We were married in the US, in one of the states that allowed same sex marriage. But at the time we lived in NC where our Marriage was not recognized on the federal level until late 2014. Well, because of this my husband over stayed his visa in the USA and is not bared. All because we were not recognized as a married couple, I had no legal standing to petition for his visa. Well Ben's Mother fell ill and we sort of dropped everything and Moved to the UK. We decided to no pursue the US visa after it became legal because we thought, that Same Sex Marriages are legal in the UK and we would have a much easier time in the UK.....BOY WERE WE WRONG. We also thought that there would be a lot less bigotry and discrimination in the UK and it would be a better to raise a family. We went about doing everything the legal way, hiring a solicitor and long story short and 1000's of pounds later......we are now on our Second Appeal. They will not let me stay, even though my Husband has a good job and makes well over the financial threshold and I am an Architectural Assistant(not yet working, because i want to stay legal and do the right thing). Both working professionals and higher tax payers they will not let me stay. Still that does not matter. We even tried to appeal to them on compassionate grounds because my Mother in law has now been told her disease is terminal. But again....the Home Office Does not care! We are no awaiting the judgment from the next hearing on what our fate is going to be. We have one more appeal after that. We are now desperate on what to do next. The stress is unbearable, not knowing where you might be living in the future. We would like to start a family here in the UK but we can't, our lives are in limbo. We are lucky enough to still be together but we are not sure how long that will last because if the Home Office decides its time for me to go. I will have to go and my husband can't come back to the states with me because he over stayed his visa. That will have to all be sorted out first which is 1000's more to fix. I'm sure we can explain what happened but it will cost 1000's to do so!!! When will this madness end!!!!!!!!!!! ANY ADVICE OR HELP is greatly appreciated.
Regards, Brian
Hi Brian - what an awful story.
DeleteWe obviously can't give advice through the comments section of a blog, but there are a number of Facebook support groups which you might find useful. I Love My Foreign Spouse is good : https://www.facebook.com/groups/139807999382936/ . This might be worth joining.
Thank you Steven,
ReplyDeleteMy apologies, I just read where no advice is given. :) I guess I should have said support! Its nice, well not nice but it makes me feel better knowing that we are not in this alone. We are at our wits end. its just so frustrating!
Thank you...
No need to apologise. :) Just pointing you in the direction of a community that might be helpful...
DeleteThanks, I just joined that group! Thanks for the support!!!!
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMaybe this can be a light in the dark tunnel for the couples from the Uk, ,Australia, Canada and Nz
ReplyDeletehttps://www.change.org/p/parliament-of-the-united-kingdom-parliament-of-australia-parliament-of-canada-parliament-of-new-zealand-advocate-and-introduce-legislation-promoting-the-free-movement-of-citizens-between-the-uk-canada-australia-and-new-zealand
Thanks to share helpful information about the UK visa immigration,i applied for UK visit visa and finally got without rejection.
ReplyDeleteInformative post!!
ReplyDeleteHey guys,
B1 visa USA is a business purpose non-immigrant visa (or visitor visa) through which you can get an entry in the USA. If Interested, just contact XIPHIAS Immigration which is India’s most awarded for their visa services providing for the last 14 years.