A South African national’s year-long legal battle to sponsor his children to remain in the United Kingdom has reached a peaceful resolution five days before they were due to be deported.
Justin Tutt’s children were left to be raised by their elderly grandparents in South Africa after his estranged wife Deirdre committed suicide in Cape Town last year. His son Seth (8) and daughter Leigh (5) were facing the threat of being taken into foster care in South Africa after the death of their mother.
Tutt campaigned to bring them to the UK, but had his visa applications declined following new rules introduced by the UK Home Office last year, stating that foreign nationals have to meet a certain threshold of income in order to send for any of their dependants.
Tutt, who holds dual British and South African citizenship, was not allowed under the guidelines to sponsor his children in the UK, who only hold South African citizenship. New government guidelines such as these have significantly brought down net migration into the UK, which remains a favourite immigration destination for South Africans.
According to the new guidelines introduced in July, residents in the UK must earn at least £22,400 per annum (plus £2,400 for each child) if they wish to sponsor visas for their foreign relatives in the UK. The Home Office would not allow Tutt to bring his children into UK under these new rules on his limited salary as a waiter.
Tutt (29), however, managed to fly his children into the UK initially on a holiday visa, which was just about to expire last week when he got his eleventh hour reprieve to have the visa converted into a settlement visa under the discretion of the Home Office on humanitarian grounds. After five years in the UK, they will be allowed to apply for British citizenship.
Tutt has had to spend more than £6,000 in legal fees so far and has to raise at least another £2,000 still to pay for the outstanding paperwork required by the Home Office. He’s campaigning for donations on Facebook and is organising a fundraising raffle event in his hometown of Burnley in early March. Among prices to be won in the raffle, you can get your car washed, a free haircut, and even a free botox treatment or tattoo.
The news of Tutt’s discretionary right to keep his children in the UK follows recent plans to make travel from South Africa to the UK easier again.