Former High Commissioner hits UK immigration

“EXCESSIVELY complex and archaic.’’ These were the words of former British High Commissioner to TT Arthur Snell when asked to describe the immigration policies of the United Kingdom’s Home Office yesterday. He said the policies and immigration laws were the cause of recent confusion surrounding the citizenship of his seven-year-old son.

Speaking with Newsday from his home in the UK, Snell expressed consternation over the initial denial of British citizenship to his son and said the laws were unnecessarily complex and left natural British citizens feeling isolated, confused and unaware of their own rights. The law needed some amendments, he said.

Asked to explain the reason for the complicated laws, Snell said, “I would say it is the history behind the laws, but that’s a poor excuse. I think they are in place to achieve the agenda of England, which has been to keep certain people out. This is unfortunate because such a complex system allows for many errors in the Home Office, and as such, many people do not know their own rights.”

Last week, British Prime Minister Theresa May and Home Secretary Amber Rudd publicly apologised to the children of Caribbean immigrants who were threatened with deportation from England. Snell said while his difficulty was eventually resolved, both issues spoke to the numerous errors within the British Home office.

“There are errors which keep being made because of the complex system in place. This should not be the case, and it’s something that many Caribbean immigrants have been denied and humiliated for over the years.”

Snell, who served as British High Commissioner to TT from 2011 - 2015, took to social media yesterday when he revealed that his son was initially denied UK citizenship because he was born in Trinidad. He said his son was ineligible for Trinidadian citizenship and lamented that despite being the son of a former British diplomat, the child was not considered to “British enough” for UK citizenship.

“In 2011 I was serving as British High Commissioner to Trinidad and Tobago. I was incredibly excited to have a son born in Trinidad. After a few weeks I received notification that he had been refused. You cannot be more British than the British High Commissioner, but he (Snell’s son) wasn’t British enough.”

Snell added while he was able to resolve the issue quickly, using his status as a diplomat, he lamented there were many others who were unable to do so.