Britain needs more doctors ... so why is this one facing deportation?
A DOCTOR on the verge of qualifying as a GP faces being thrown out of Britain because he was just a few days late renewing his visa.
After ten years in the UK, including seven working for the NHS, Dr Luke Ong, who is from Singapore, tried to book an appointment with officials to extend his stay.
But they said they could only see him on September 2 last year – 18 days after his visa had expired.
Even though he was days from gaining an automatic right to remain in the UK as someone who has been in the country legitimately for ten years, he was declared an illegal immigrant and told he must leave.
His taxpayer-funded GP training was brought to an immediate halt with just five months to go, and his passport and medical degree certificate were confiscated.
Dr Ong, 31, claims he is being treated like an ‘intruder’, and has spent the last seven months fighting for permission to stay. ‘I have given the best years of my life to the NHS, toiling relentlessly through nights and weekends ... paying my taxes and contributing to wider society,’ he said at his home in Manchester. ‘Sadly all this counts for nothing, and the Home Office are now treating me as an illegal immigrant.
‘Any other country would be happy to have a doctor work for their health service, especially somebody who is locally trained, but here I face endless persecution by the Home Office, having to suffer the indignity of being treated like an unwanted intruder, despite having lived here since September 2007. I am broken, and I don’t know how much longer I can take this.’
The case comes as the NHS plans to spend £100million to bring in 3,000 foreign GPs to alleviate shortages. Recruitment agencies will earn around £20,000 for each successful placement in England.
Last night, former Labour home secretary Lord Blunkett branded the treatment of Dr Ong ‘crackers’ and called on Home Secretary Amber Rudd to intervene in his case.
Dr Ong came to the UK from Singapore to study medicine
‘Treated like an intruder’
at the University of Manchester in September 2007.
His five-year course was funded by his parents and he qualified as a doctor in 2012. His student visa was extended for a further five years. He worked for two years as a hospital doctor in Blackburn before joining a GP training course based at Tameside Hospital, Greater Manches- ter. Dr Ong attempted to book an appointment to secure indefinite leave to remain last July. Although his visa expired on August 15, a meeting on September 2 was the first date officials said was available. His application was then turned down on the grounds he had met officials after the deadline.
Dr Ong’s initial appeal was upheld by an immigration judge, who ruled it ‘would not be proportionate’ to remove him, and to do so would breach his human rights.
But the Government has applied to take the case to a higher tribunal in order to throw him out.
Dr Ong, who has started a petition against his removal – which has 26,000 signatures, said: ‘I’m fighting so hard to stay ... I want to be a GP here.
‘I’ve enjoyed working in the NHS for seven years. There aren’t enough GPs ... When you are so desperate, it flabbergasts me that the Home Office is so blind.’ Last night Lord Blunkett said: ‘ The Home Secretary should use executive authority to bring common sense to bear, and concentrate the resources of the department on enforcement against criminals.’
Labour MP Yvette Cooper, who chairs the home affairs select committee, said: ‘Trying to send home doctors who were trained here simply because of bureaucratic immigration delays at the same time as the NHS is being forced to recruit lots of new doctors from abroad makes no sense at all.’
Tory MP Tim Loughton added: ‘We are desperately short of GPs ... and should be biting his arm off, not giving him his marching orders.’ The Home Office said it would be ‘inappropriate’ to comment while the case is ongoing, adding: ‘All visa applications are considered in line with immigration rules and on the evidence provided.’