LONDON (The Guardian) – The Home Office is systematically barring young children from joining their mothers in Britain despite extensive proof the women are their primary caregivers, an Observer investigation revealed.
Under an opaque policy condemned as discriminatory and “inhumane”, the government has refused dozens of visas for children of migrant single mothers, many of whom came to work in the NHS or social care, saying there are “no compelling reasons” to grant them.
The women left their children – some as young as two – in the temporary care of relatives or friends while they moved to Britain from countries including Zimbabwe, Zambia, Kenya, South Africa and India.
Before leaving, they say, they had been reassured by their employers that their children would be able to follow, in line with current immigration rules permitting healthcare workers to bring close family members. But when they applied for the children’s visas, the applications were rejected.
In refusal letters seen by the Observer, the Home Office questioned why the children could not stay permanently with their grandparents or other relatives. In other cases, it said there was no reason why they could not go to live with their fathers, even though their mothers had sole custody or the fathers had not seen the children for years. Many of the letters, addressed directly to the children, conclude, “It was your mother’s personal decision to depart for the UK and you have not provided sufficient evidence to grant your visa on serious or compelling grounds.”
The cases have come to light weeks after the government announced a plan to slash immigration by placing restrictions on the dependants of migrant healthcare workers. Under controversial rules expected to be introduced this spring, care workers coming to the UK will be barred from bringing family members, while other health workers will have to earn £29,000 a year, rising to £38,700 in 2025, to be permitted to do so.
But scores of applications from such workers are already being quietly refused. The Observer has examined 10 cases, and been alerted to 140 more, where migrant women, all single mothers, have had visas for children denied in the past 18 months.
The applications have not been rejected because the Home Office doubts they are genuine or that the women are the children’s primary caregivers. Instead, they have been refused under a Home Office rule that a child may only be given a visa if both parents are living in the UK, unless the parent living here has “sole responsibility”.