UKBA balls up: Border Agency tell Welsh photographer his wife will have to leave country and that he 'wasn't British'

Colville, whose mother is Welsh and father is English married Canadian citizen Crystal, now Mrs Colville. The UK Border Agency first told him he was 'not a British citizen' and later admitted there had been a 'clerical error'.

A letter from UKBA informed the Canadian 'If you do not leave the United Kingdom voluntarily, you will be removed to Canada.'
“My wife and I are extremely upset by how poorly the Home Office have treated our case,” Mr Colville, who met his wife when they were working onboard a cruise ship in 2006, told Denbighshire Free Press.

“It should have been very straightforward as I am a British citizen.”

Mr Colville fears the newly wedded couple may have to seperate “I do not have the right to live or work in Canada and my worst fear is that we would be separated again, ruining everything we have worked towards."

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As is often the case with ongoing cases, UKBA have retained Crystal's passport: "The Border Agency are still holding Crystal's passport, which means she can't return home to see her family. Her brother is quadraplegic and she hasn't seen him in two years."

Crystal explained her situation to the Denbighshire paper.

"It's driving me nuts just thinking about it. It affects everything I do. My little brother is in a wheelchair, so he can't fly. His birthday was on Sunday and I wanted to fly home and surprise him, but I couldn't."

"It seems that they want me to leave the country, but at the same time they won't let me because they're holding my passport."

A spokesman for UKBA told the Daily Mail: "The original paperwork sent to Ms Levy contained a clerical error regarding her husband’s nationality and we have written to her this week to clarify the situation."

"We are clear her husband is a UK national and the error did not affect our decision to refuse Ms Levy’s application for further leave to remain, which was made because she did not meet the necessary financial requirements."