Marrying to Obtain Citizenship and Fake Marriages

Responses on yahoo answers to someone who wanted to work in the UK:

“Marry a Brit. It’s that simple.”

“Sorry my friend. You have to live with what life has given you. At your age, almost impossible to get British citizenship, even at 18 would be hard. You could marry a British girl, but even then to become a citizen you will need to stay married for a couple of years, live and work in the UK… too much hassle just to join the British Paras.”

”There is another means in which you might be eligible to apply for British Citizenship. If you are married to someone who is a citizen of Britain, you might have a path to become a citizen. You and your spouse will be evaluated and questioned to ensure that you are married for love and not simply to gain access to citizenship. You cannot apply for citizenship under this method until you live in the UK for a minimum of three years.”

It seems that the general and most common way of seeking to obtain British citizenship is not through waiting for the five years and then applying and paying the money the clean and honest way, but rather through finding a person that they can use to obtain citizenship is a dishonest and cheating way. 

Marrying a UK citizen will usually permit a foreign national to live and work in the UK.  However, this is not automatic and there is definitely no immediate entitlement to citizenship for a foreign spouse.  New restrictions have been imposed because some immigrants marry British citizens purely to become British themselves.  Therefore, people subject to immigration control may have to obtain a certificate of approval of marriage from the home office before they are permitted to marry in the UK.

The government clean up on scam marriages was begun in 2004.  In 2008, official figures demonstrated that the number of fake marriages performed by Anglican priests has risen by as much as 400 per cent in some dioceses in the last four years.  Senior church officials believe that immigrants, who claim that their marriages are genuine, despite advice from their bishops stressing the need for them to be vigilant, are being duped by many of their colleagues.  The increase in applications for common licences has risen from 90 in 2004 to 493 last year.  Such dramatic rises are being repeated across the country.  Damien Green, the shadow immigration minister, called on the government to close the loophole, which is enabling thousands of British immigrants to attain citizenship.