The UK’s care crisis has led to agencies recruiting outside of the UK since Brexit, and many care workers have come from Zimbabwe. Many are single mothers, who were assured their children could come with them. Once settled in the UK, they applied for visas for their children, who were waiting back home in temporary arrangements, but these visas were refused. This is Ani’s story.
“My name is Ani. I’m here on a tier 2 visa. I come from Zimbabwe. I have two girls that I left back at home when they were 8 and 12. I came to the UK as a carer in 2023 because I was assured that I could bring my children. But I’ve not seen them for almost two years.
I’m divorced and I’ve been raising my children alone. My first visa application for them was in December 2023. I submitted my divorce decree and my sole custody documents from the court in Zimbabwe. In early 2024 I got my first refusal. They said there was insufficient evidence of ‘sole responsibility’.
I got legal advice and support that cost me over £1,600. I’m on minimum wage and I get paid only for the hours that I work so you can imagine… So I saved up for months and I managed to get ‘sole responsibility’ approved by the High Court in Zimbabwe. With this evidence, we applied again in June 2024, using a London law firm. We got another refusal, on my little girl’s tenth birthday. That was devastating. I couldn't tell them. I asked my lawyers what happened, what can we do? They weren’t able to tell me. They asked me to pay them more (£1500 per child) for a review which I declined as 90% of these are denied (it’s basically the Home Office marking its own homework).
Fortunately at that point I got introduced to Women of Zimbabwe (WoZ). They helped me understand what kind of documents the Home Office will consider and how to write cover letters and statements. In October 2024, I applied again. The next day we got an email saying what we submitted was insufficient, we need more information. I went back to WoZ in tears. We sent additional information that we thought they would require, and then there was silence. And then a month later, we got another email for more additional information. We were stunned.
This journey is very isolating. Then there’s been the emotional trauma of it. My kids are girls – there are many life changes I’ve not been there for. My eldest one became a teenager. My youngest started her periods. The teacher phoned me, saying you need to advise your daughter… So we parent by phone. And we try to explain to our children why we are so far away. When I left I said, I’ll come get you in three, six months. Now they keep asking me ‘Mum, what happened? When are you coming to get us?’
People at home are saying, ‘Hey, you said six months – come and take your children! You’re the mother’. There’s so much to deal with: you want to go see your children, but you can’t afford to because you're saving up to pay for the next visa application. You have to balance all of those emotions, and you only get paid for the hours that you work. So if you take time off because you need to calm down, you're not getting paid. But lawyers need to be paid, visa fees to be paid, rent needs to be paid.
My story has a happy ending. Finally on 12th December, I heard that my now ten year old’s visa was successful. You can imagine my happiness. And then my eldest’s visa came a week later, so I could finally tell them. But the journey was harrowing. Had it not been for WoZ, honestly I was starting to question a lot of things: what kind of mother am I? What do I do?
Home Office policy is not consistent – for example, you see one mother getting refused her child’s visa because she has got sole custody, but then you see another mother get the visa for the same reason. As mothers we would just like to know: ‘What do we need to do?’ ”
Ani was finally reunited with her girls after almost two years apart. But Women of Zimbabwe (WoZ) has been contacted by thousands of single mothers in this position. They all arrived before 11th March 2024, when new rules came in barring care workers from bringing dependents, so they had the right to bring their children. Our analysis found the visa process was inconsistent, unclear, discriminatory against single mothers, and culturally illiterate. We are asking the Home Office to take eight steps to address this miscarriage of justice, including reviewing outstanding cases and providing clarity on what evidence they accept.
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