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Spouse Visa Rules - how would YOU have solved the problem?

Spouse Visa Rules - how would YOU have solved the problem?

Old Jan 16th 2013, 8:31 am
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Default Spouse Visa Rules - how would YOU have solved the problem?

I think it is fair to say that a lot of people here are against the new rules for sponsoring spouse visas and are either directly affected themselves or, thanks to their personal experiences, able to easily relate to those who are. I thought I’d start a thread to see if anyone has any better solution to the problem than the one the government have put in place…

A large part of my life has been shaped by the practicalities of visas. I left the UK (Birmingham/Nottingham)12 years ago to move to another EU country partly because I liked it there and partly because it was easier for my girlfriend (who is non-EU) to stay there than to get a UK visa. We married, moved within Europe and then to Asia and watched as it became progressively harder to apply for an EEA-Family permit or a visa for her to visit the UK (without any rule changes). Little things like the introduction of biometrics, the outsourcing of the application centres, ECOs being officially unable to speak to you (although usually very friendly and willing to talk) – all made a big difference. We applied under the old rules and were denied, appealed and had the appeal upheld (the judge was rather scathing and also recommended that we get immediate ILE rather than KOL-Req as she had passed the LITUK test which the appeal was underway). So now we are back, we initially lived in Tower Hamlets and I was amazed by the number of foreigners on the streets – the daily mail was right! Coming from Birmingham in the 80s of course it was little different but we lived in a “nice white neighbourhood”. The council administration buildings have signs in 7 or 8 languages with English somewhere in the middle, a lot of people there (at the benefits & housing counters) spoke no word of English, but that’s OK – the council employees didn’t have English as their mother tongue either.

After a little thinking it dawned on me, though – most of the un-integrated, non-English speaking foreigners I saw had British passports but would fail any applicable form of the Cricket test! The poles, Czechs, French, Aussies etc who I’ve met since being here are damned hard workers, they came here to work and earn money and pay taxes into our system. Likewise a lot of the West-Indian and African people I see in London are Londoners through and through, but then their grandparents are the ones who migrated.

So for me there would be two different changes for the government to make:
  1. Firstly, introduce the concept of “hereditary British Citizen” and abolish “citizen by descent”. A hereditary citizen is one who is minimum third generation British. Only hereditary citizens can pass on citizenship to children born outside the UK. Hereditary citizens are able to sponsor a spouse with no other requirements than a genuine, subsisting relationship. Marriage to a hereditary citizen entitles you to non-hereditary citizenship after 5 years regardless of whether or not you live in the UK. Keep the rules for non-hereditary citizens as you do for any other settled person with financial and other requirements to sponsor a spouse.
  2. Secondly - how we define and what we give as benefits. My impression is that most of the Eastern-European EU migrants who are “here on benefits” are actually in work. Our benefits system just brings them up to a far higher level than they would get back home on top of that. Hell, maybe it would even be legal to have different benefits levels for hereditary and non-hereditary citizens at which point EU migrants would be treated the same as non-hereditary

There are a few people I’m really hoping will post and join in on here, let’s see...
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