Visa fee U-turn for man hoping to reunite family

The couple's daughter, who was born in Canada, is a UK citizen

A father who could not afford to apply for a visa needed to move his family from Canada to the UK has had the fee waived.

Christopher Wade's two-year-old daughter has a British passport, but his wife was required to pay application fees and a NHS surcharge of more than £4,500.

The couple's application to get the costs waived was rejected in July, but two days after the BBC reported the case in October, the Home Office reversed its decision.

Mr Wade, from Ashington, in Northumberland, said the exemption was "still sinking in" and a decision on the visa was still to be made. The Home Office said it did not comment on individual cases.

The supermarket delivery driver said the governmental body's U-turn on the application costs had taken "quite a bit of weight off my shoulders".

The couple had applied for an exemption based on being unable to afford the payment.

The Home Office will decide whether to grant a family visa.

"I'm really happy we've managed to take this huge step forward but I'm still 50:50 disheartened - it's not over yet," he said.

"There is a part of us when I'm walking around at work thinking - have they read the story? What do they think?" he said.

He said he should not have had to go through "such lengths" to get the fee waiver.

Chris Wade said he and his wife could not afford the visa and NHS fee

Mr Wade's daughter Layla was born in Canada and has British citizenship.

He met his wife, a government administrative worker, in Canada and they married in 2022.

He planned to move across the Atlantic but when they discovered his wife was five months pregnant, the couple decided to settle in the UK where Mr Wade had an extended family network to help with childcare.

However, due to debts he had accrued earlier in his life, as well as daycare costs, it was impossible for the couple to save up the £1,938 required for a UK family visa application as well as £2,588 for the required two-and-a-half-year NHS surcharge, he said.

Chris Boyle, who works for the charity North East Law Centre and is giving the couple free advice, said he believed they had always met the Home Office's exemption requirements and that they had been wrongly rejected in July.

He said there had been no explanation from the Home Office for its U-turn.

Mr Wade said he understood the need for immigration rules but felt the current system unfairly penalised UK citizens with families and children abroad.

"All these problems are unnecessarily ruining people's lives," he said.