Volunteer, UK and the enlightened west
Dear All
As you know the UK Border Agency (UKBA) introduced a new system for visas to the UK last year.
NGOs in the UK have been campaigning for change. However, as we are in the middle of an election no-one is interested. We plan to take this issue up with the new government.
In the meantime, we have no choice but to comply.
This means that anyone who needs a visa for the UK will have to be allocated a certificate number NGOs. We have to apply online and pay for this certificate number.
Volunteers who are allocated a certificate and then cancel also cause us trouble because if they do not use the certificate, the UKBA want to know why we allocated it and why the volunteer didn't use it.
So, we are asking that you stress the importance of being serious about volunteering in the UK, and if a volunteer applies that they intend to come here.
Volunteers that do come here on a visitor visa must not mention that they might do some volunteering, otherwise they will be put in a detention centre and returned on the next flight, and their passport will be marked. So if they come back to Britain for a visit another time, they will be refused entry because their passport has been marked as having links to an international volunteering organisation!!
I am not joking, I know people this has happened to!
I'm sure Al Qaeda don't have this amount of trouble.
Oh, I love living in a democracy in the enlightened west!
P/S: Dated April 2010
As you know the UK Border Agency (UKBA) introduced a new system for visas to the UK last year.
NGOs in the UK have been campaigning for change. However, as we are in the middle of an election no-one is interested. We plan to take this issue up with the new government.
In the meantime, we have no choice but to comply.
This means that anyone who needs a visa for the UK will have to be allocated a certificate number NGOs. We have to apply online and pay for this certificate number.
Volunteers who are allocated a certificate and then cancel also cause us trouble because if they do not use the certificate, the UKBA want to know why we allocated it and why the volunteer didn't use it.
So, we are asking that you stress the importance of being serious about volunteering in the UK, and if a volunteer applies that they intend to come here.
Volunteers that do come here on a visitor visa must not mention that they might do some volunteering, otherwise they will be put in a detention centre and returned on the next flight, and their passport will be marked. So if they come back to Britain for a visit another time, they will be refused entry because their passport has been marked as having links to an international volunteering organisation!!
I am not joking, I know people this has happened to!
I'm sure Al Qaeda don't have this amount of trouble.
Oh, I love living in a democracy in the enlightened west!
P/S: Dated April 2010
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