Stop The Service Charge: why immigration barriers for non-UK Armed Forces Personnel must be removed

Fraser Briton is Poppyscotland’s Public Relations Manager. His work is centred around ensuring the public and key stakeholders are readily aware of the work undertaken by Poppyscotland, and that the Armed Forces community remain in the Scottish public’s conscience.

Do you think that non-UK nationals serving in the United Kingdom’s Armed Forces should have to pay a sum equivalent to more than half their starting salary to keep their family living together in the country they serve?

RBL and Poppyscotland don’t.

Thanks to our joint campaigning efforts, the Home Office announced in March 2024 that Minimum Income Requirements for non-UK personnel serving in the UK Armed Forces will be brought in line with their starting salary. This is an important step in enabling non-UK spouses and children of UK Armed Forces personnel to join their partner here, which would not have been possible if higher Minimum Income Requirements applied. ?

But this isn’t the end of our campaign. The Home Office needs to go further.?

Indefinite Leave to Remain fees?

That’s why we are calling on the UK Government to remove Indefinite Leave to Remain fees for families of non-UK personnel Serving in the UK Armed Forces.

Thanks to RBL and Poppyscotland’s ‘Stop the Service Charge’ campaign, personnel who have served in the UK Armed Forces for at least six years (or have been medically discharged if they have served under six years) are no longer required to pay the ￡2,900 Indefinite Leave to Remain fee. But their family members still stump this bill.

Initial visa fees to bring a family member to the UK are almost ￡1850. Once families have resided in the UK for five years, they can apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain.

The fees are substantial, amounting to almost ￡2,900 per person.??

• For a spouse and two children, the total cost will be nearly ￡8,700.??
• The entire process for bringing a spouse and two children to the UK and settling in the UK, will cost over ￡14,000.??
• This is all whilst on a salary that will predominantly be placed below, or in line with, the median average UK salary. ?

Consider your salary. Look at your bank balance.??

Could you afford it???

The wage after basic training in the UK Armed Forces is ￡23,496, meaning that difficult decisions have to be made about whether and when to bring all, some, or no family to the UK.

There are over 6,000 non-UK nationals currently serving in the UK Armed Forces, often with partners and children who play a vital role in supporting them. And, one in eight spouses and partners of UK Armed Forces personnel report having a non-UK nationality, increasing the number of people that the Home Office impacts with this policy.

Kelevi’s story?

To make such choices has seriously detrimental impacts on their lives, on their abilities to function.

Kelevi is an Infanteer in the Royal Regiment of Scotland. Originally from Fiji, he left his wife and three young children behind when he joined the UK Armed Forces.

Poppyscotland paid the visa fees and airfares so that his family could join him in Inverness, but the process took four years.

He told us about the impact of separation, and of the Home Office’s policies:

"After the first two months away from my kids, I thought about quitting, it was so hard for me.

"How can I perform at 100% if all I am worrying about is ‘what is wrong with my family, how are my kids, my wife, how is their wellbeing?’"

All Service personnel should have the right to be surrounded by their families, regardless of where they are born. They already face challenges that the rest of society don’t have to. They already go above and beyond. ??

The cost of obtaining Indefinite Leave to Remain status for families is not representative of the gratitude that our Armed Forces community deserve.??

Removing these fees would recognise the sacrifices and unique challenges that the Armed Forces community are faced with. It would also enable the government to fulfil its obligations under the Covenant, which is supposed to remove the disadvantages and barriers to family life faced by those who Serve.??

To read our General Election Manifesto 2024 in full, visit: rbl.org.uk/Manifesto2024 ?

?