Spouse Migration Rules 'Unfair' To UK Citizens Home Office Minister Says

Home Office Minister James Brokenshire admits that UK Citizens wishing to bring their spouses to the UK are getting a raw deal. At present any British Citizen wishing to bring their spouse to the UK has to prove they earn £18,600 whereas other EU Citizens settled in the UK do not.

He says now that he will try to close this loophole, so all those EU Citizens settled in the UK and wanting to bring their none EU spouses here and do not earn £18,600 per annum better get a move on

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31377750

When I saw the headline I was thinking that maybe they are going to drop the £18,600 rule, on further reading I believe that its only fair that other EU citizens should be under the same laws as British citizens whilst settled here in the UK. As the story highlights, its unfair, but didn't they realise that when they introduced the law?

We should all be playing by the same set of rules, we are all EU citizens after all, whether we want to be or not. I have mixed feelings about the £18,600 rule, one part of me thinks it makes good commercial sense from a Governmental point of view and the romantic side of me says its unjust to keep spouses and loved ones apart.

I am especially cynical when it comes to immigration matters, I feel that you will never read anything good regarding the easing of visa restrictions and so on, in fact we will only read the opposite.

He could do something about the absurd and unfair cost of the Visa.

It is unjustly very expensive but I would be extremely surprised if the price ever goes down.

I would like to know how they settle at a certain price for a visa, throw silly prices into a hat maybe?

The cost of the visa is supposed to reflect the costs of processing the application so doubtless includes the cost of having all those Home Office employees work at the Embassy and live in some luxurious condo nearby. It's the cost of FLR/ILR that's even more scandalous and I think I paid only around £80 at the start of the century.

The whole visa thing is a scandal really.

The costs are ridiculous, and anyone who is working and paying tax should be allowed the bring their wife here to live with them.

Absolutely not! That sounds fine in theory but it would simply make the situation regarding sham marriages even worse.

What have sham marriages got to do with it?

No... let's make it fair, charge everybody! That's their mentality

Don't feel picked on Dom Think of it as right time, right place. That is the visa process in my eyes anyhow, all about timing. We missed out after the July 2012 financial rules. I still get pissed to this day that we were just weeks away from avoiding that darned rule, plus no FLR, grrrr