I am a Professor of Bristolian and even I am a victim of the UK Home Office's hostile environment. Let me explain. I am not really a Professor of Bristolian. I played such a character in the Terry's Bristolian Language Lessons DVD and afterwards I set up a Professor of Bristolian facebook page which became far more popular than I ever expected, allowing me to indulge my rather bizarre and surreal sense of humour to the full! So why am I a victim of the UK Home Office's hostile environment? Well, it's quite a long story. I nearly had to refuse the offer to appear in the aforementioned DVD because I had moved to Sardinia a few months before, in order to be with my Sardinian/Italian girlfriend, now my wife. It was only the fact that I was back in Bristol for ten days, at the very time filming was taking place, that I was able to play the role of a Professor of Bristolian in the DVD. This was way back in 2010, when there was no mention of a referendum on membership in the EU and Brexit wasn't even a word. My wife has always had an interest in the English language and in British culture and told me that she used to dream of one day living in the UK. "Well," I thought, "I like it here in Sardinia, but I'm still rather attached to my native city of Bristol. No problem, perhaps one day we'll be able to go back and live there." Wrong! I'll explain why.
Everything changed when we woke up in bed and breakfast accommodation in Naples, on our way down to Calabria in the far south of Italy for a family wedding. On the television news that morning, in June 2016, we learnt about how the British had voted in a referendum to leave the EU. Shortly after, I wrote a blogpost What Brexit Could Mean To a Bristolian In Sardinia in which I voiced my concerns about how the referendum vote might impact us negatively. Some of my concerns were unfounded. I am now old enough to be receiving my state pension and there are no problems there. Similarly, the Easyjet service, from Bristol to Olbia in Sardinia, appears to be safe for the time being, on account of the company having made necessary adjustments to their business. However, one of my gravest concerns was expressed thus:
I had read articles like this in the Guardian about British people needing a minimum income of £18,600 per annum in order to bring their foreign spouses over to live in the UK. In the event of Brexit would that rule be extended to British ex-pats with a spouse from a EU member state should they wish to return to live in the UK? If so we might find ourselves with an insurmountable obstacle to overcome should we decide that one day we want to set up home again in my native city of Bristol. People have tried to reassure me. "No, it could never come to that!" they say. I'm not so sure. I never believed that there would ever come a time when the disabled and the unemployed would be treated with such crass insensitivity and cruelty as they have been under the present Conservative government with Cameron, Osborne and Duncan-Smith (for most of the time) at the helm.
Well, sadly, it has come to that, even though we had no plans to return to live in the UK in the foreseeable future. In fact, thanks to the hostile environment being further enforced by the new British Immigration Bill that became law last November, it's far worse. I recently checked the costs involved in the case of an EU spouse, of a British citizen, applying for a visa to live in the UK after 31st March 2022. I was absolutely flabbergasted. The spouse visa fee for an 'out of country' application is £1,523; the Immigration Health Surcharge £1,872 (for being able to use the NHS. I might add here that in the summer of 2012 I had a mild heart attack and received excellent treatment at one of the local hospitals here in Nuoro. It cost us nothing! So much for health tourism in the UK!) Then there's £150 for an English language test (even though my wife's written English is far better than that of a lot of native brits); and finally, up to £300 for the translation of essential documents like marriage, birth and divorce certificates. There are other potential costs that probably wouldn't affect us. Don't believe me? Read this on the Migrate website. So, irrespective of the minimum income requirements, it would cost us nearly £4,000 for the undoubted privilege of living in the UK for just two and a half years. No thanks. I hardly think that is value for money, especially as the country seems to be in a far worse shape than it was when I left in November 2009. We'll stick to the joys of a warmer climate in Sardinia with its spectacular beaches and scenery, better quality food and wine, culinary delights like culurgiones and delicious liqueurs like mirto. OK, the driving here can be a bit indisciplined, the road planning and bureaucracy bewildering, but overall, life is pretty good!
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| Santa Maria Navarrese, Ogliastra, Sardinia |
