Soldier's wife leaves UK over row

The couple met while L/Cpl Crozier was stationed in Canada

The wife of a Northumberland soldier has travelled to Spain after the Home Office threatened her with deportation.

L/Cpl Andrew Crozier, 23, from Prudhoe, married his Canadian wife Samantha, 23, while serving in Canada in 2004.

But when the couple recently moved to barracks in Hampshire, her application for full citizenship was rejected and she was told to leave Britain by April.

The mother-of-two has now gone to Spain in a last ditch attempt to re-apply for a temporary visa.

British passports

Mrs Crozier said: "I am furious, I can't explain how upset and disappointed I am with the British Embassy, the Home Office and the Army as a whole.

Mrs Crozier says her husband's sacrifices should be considered

"I feel I have been let down by the UK. I am destroyed at the possibility of being without Andrew and the children. I might have been born in Canada but I am a British army wife."

The couple moved to Germany soon after they got married when L/Cpl Crozier was posted there with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers.

In that time they had two children, Ethan, two, and one-year-old Caleb, who were both granted full British passports.

When the family learned they were to be moved to the UK, Mrs Crozier was granted a temporary visa but her application for full citizenship was rejected.

The Home Office said if she stayed in the UK after her six-month visa ran out in April it would breach rules designed to protect the immigration system from abuse.

A spokeswoman said: "The government is determined to protect the UK's immigration system and marriage laws from abuse.

"Applicants who do not meet the requirements for leave to remain as a spouse will be expected to return home and apply for entry clearance."