love does not a marriage make if you're an immigrant....

[ruty]

On Channel 4 news this evening. Apparently it's been the law for two years now. Immigrants have to apply to the Home Office for permission to marry a UK citizen. If there are only a few months left on their visa it is likey they'll be turned down. Marriages have gone down in some London boroughs by as much as 58%. I know a few marriages might be shams, but i don't think the govt have a right to tell people if they can get married. It sent a shiver down my spine as dh and i got married on the quick when his visa was just about to run out, because we wanted to stay together. If he had had to apply to the govt, it is like he would have been turned down, and beloved ds wouldn't even exist.
[dh works hard and pays his taxes btw]

There were a couple (older couple) married 5 years but she's being sent back to Kenya on the local (HTV) news yesterday, she thinks she'll be killed as she was a political activist before she came here.

FGS

So very very wrong

My brother (dual NZ and UK passports) is engaged to an Aussie lass her visa runs out next year.
They are moving to Oz rather than face the grillings.
Makes those who are sincere feel like criminals IMO

My ds1 would have been caught by this rule as his dw is American. They got married almost 5yrs ago.

My DH and I were given 6 months to get married (Its how long the give you for a fiance's visa) I was treated awful. They treat you like you ae a lying criminal who wants to come and get free medical when all you want is to be with someone because you love them so much. I understand that some people take advantage, but thats no way to treat people.

I think you also know that a Long distance relationship no matter how hard you try might not work. I know I felt like Immigration was screwing with my life. I hadn't overstayed my visas but I was visiting all the time. So I'd spend one week at home then come to the UK for two. They deported me once just because they thought I was visiting too often. I was horrfied I hadn't broken any laws. Thats when we felt we had to get engaged.

Actually I'm applying today for work experience with the immigration support poepl (NOT the home office) because this amkes me so

Surely (and I have no idea how much this is done, didnt seem at all when we married 7 years ago) if they networked the registry offices etc with birth certs / etc, and a photo, then they could at least control the amount of scammers? Coz mainly they seem to be the i'mm amrry anyone for fifty quid brigade.

Maybe then the genuines can have some dignity?

Wonder if Euan Blair wanted to marry Chelsea Clinton or one of the Bush girls, how much grief they'd get from the home office.....

it just shocked me to think dh, who went through hell trying to get indefinte leave to remain here anyway, could have been denied 'permission' to get married. Macedonia hasn'
t even been given a hope in hell to join the EU yet, even though it is in better shape in many ways than Romania or Bulgaria. My MIL has to queue for ages and then gets a grilling by the embassy every time she applies to come and visit us. Talk about second class citizens.

DH didn't get much help from the immigration support people Peachy - they could do with more people like you...

They could use some people with a bit of sensitivity.

Thanks Ruty [smile} its really just whether they can accomodate me needing to start at ten because of DS1's Sn.

Fingers crossed though! Working for an organisation like the Immigration Advisory Service would be a serious alternative to teaching (and closely linked to my career history as well, HomeStart)

Paula that's one thing I am LOL!

That's not necessarily true at all.

It means they cannot change from a visitor visa - or any visa of the duration of 6 months or less - to a spousal visa.

W/o first going back to their home country and applying for a fiance visa OR marrying their intended in their home country and then obtaining a spousal visa from a British Embassy there.

The Kenyan man came in on one visa, applied for another, was turned down, and then married a Scottish woman. He then never applied for the appropriate visa - which, back then, it was possible to change from short-term visa to spouse visa and remain in the UK.

All they want him to do is go back to Kenya, apply for the spousal visa from there, and return to UK on that.

Its true, I had to go to New York to get my fiance's visa. Luckily I was able to do my spousal visa from the UK.

Yes.

If you enter the UK on a fiance visa you can marry in the UK and change to a spousal visa whilst remaining in the UK.

Did you have any difficulty Expat?

I went through the interrogation when we applied for a marriage licence. Despite the fact that I have indefinite leave to remain, and had it long before I met dh, and despite the fact that I was obviously pregnant, I still mas made to feel like I was a criminal.

Having said that, I was also in a bit of a bind as my daughter would have been refused a British passport if we were not married, and I would have had to go through the hassle of applying for residency for her at birth (this is what happened to my sister in the same situation), so I had no choice but to grit my teeth and marry the boy despite them.

Luckily sometimes it works out like it did with me and DH, but I have to wonder if there is a high divorce rate in these sorts of circumstances. You have to rush into a marriage.