South African may miss baby's birth over UK visa wrangle

July 09 2009 by Mark Johnstone

Man may miss baby's birth over UK visa wrangle

A South African man is set for heartbreak after he was told he may miss out on the birth of his first child because of a complicated wrangle with his UK visa.

Andre Van Coller has been married to his English wife, Helen Barnes, for over a year and she is due to give birth in just over two weeks. Mr Coller has already missed out on most of the pregnancy after his UK visa application was rejected earlier this year. The couple is devastated that he may not be allowed into the UK for their child’s birth.

Mr Coller described his treatment as “harsh” while his twenty-seven-year-old wife, Miss Barnes who is from Norfolk, said: “I just really want Andre back for the birth. The birth of your first child is something you can never get back and when your baby is small they change so much. I worry that Andre is going to miss all of this.

“The last time he saw me I was five months pregnant and he has only been able to go to one of the scans.”

Their efforts to convince UK immigration authorities to allow Mr Coller into the UK for the birth are being supported by North Norfolk MP Norman Lamb. He said: “It seems very callous for a family to be divided at this critical moment” and he has vowed to help overturn the UK immigration authorities decision.

The couple first met in 2007 in England when Mr Van Coller said he was in the country on a five year visitor’s UK visa that should have run until February 2010.

During 2007 Miss Barnes fell pregnant but the couple were to suffer the tragedy of an ectopic pregnancy a few months later.

In June 2008 they got engaged and in November they were delighted to find out that Miss Barnes was pregnant once more.

But their good news was marred by their discovery that there was a problem with Mr Van Coller's UK visa - he had wrongly thought his visa allowed him to be self-employed to work in the UK and so had been working as a self-employed diver without the correct UK work visa.

He returned to South Africa in December 2008 to sort out the UK work visa problem and Miss Barnes said he was told if he needed to return to the UK quickly to be with her he would be able to get a three month visitor visa on arrival in the UK as long as he had a return flight booked.

But when Mr Van Coller travelled to London at the end of January this year he was tolld by UK immigration authorities to return immediately to South Africa. Miss Barnes said officials told Mr Van Coller they thought he was returning to work in the UK and not just to be with Miss Barnes, but that if he returned to his native country the visa situation could be sorted out.

The couple had originally planned to wed in England this summer but instead Miss Barnes travelled to South Africa in March where they married and soon after Mr Van Coller applied for a settlement UK visa that would allow him back into the UK.

But in May the application to move to the UK was refused and the reason given on the refusal document stated it was because the entry clearance officer said Mr Van Coller made “false representations in the form of deception” when he arrived back in the UK in January.

After submitting an appeal application, the couple have now been told they must wait until October to find out when this appeal will be heard.

A UK Border Agency spokesman said: “All applications for entry clearance are considered on their individual merits, in accordance with the UK immigration rules, taking into account all evidence provided, including immigration history.

“Anyone refused a spouse visa can apply to the independent courts who will consider whether the decision was correct.”

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