A SCOTS MP has accused the Home Office of acting like “modern-day Scrooges” by taking no notice of mitigating circumstances in immigration applications.

The SNP’s Tommy Sheppard was speaking after The National revealed the latest example of the UK Government’s hostile environment – forcing an American woman and her Scottish husband to spend the festive season apart after refusing her a visa.

Julianna Colaianni gained her master’s degree from Northumbria University in December 2016 and married Tony Duffy, a self-employed plasterer in Edinburgh, in January last year. Her application for a spousal visa was rejected after a 10-month wait because Duffy did not meet the minimum income requirements, but his wife said that medical evidence about her mother-in-law and her husband was ignored. She has since returned to the US to submit another visa application.

Sheppard said he would not give up on the couple’s case, the circumstances of which were becoming more commonplace.

He told The National: “This is not just a hostile environment – at this time of year they’re playing modern-day Scrooges with the miserableness of Tory Government policy. In cases like this it’s a real double whammy for people because if you’re unfortunate enough to have fallen into difficulties for whatever reason, particularly with your health which means you can’t earn the same money as you were before, not only do you suffer the poverty and health problems, but effectively your partner gets sent to the other side of the world – it’s particularly draconian.”

Sheppard said there was no flexibility in the Home Office: “You come up against this wall ... people refusing to be human about it.

“You’d think given the criticism they’re received about the hostile environment they might actually try to build a bit more empathy into the system.”

He added: “We do a lot of immigration cases and I always imagine what would happen if other countries treated us the same way as we treat people from other countries if we were trying to go live there with somebody we loved and start a family.

“It’s shocking. They almost start from the presumption that you’re up to no good and you’re guilty until proven innocent.

“The other thing is the number of applications people have to make – it’s clearly a money-making exercise for the Home Office.”

A charity that helps migrants in the UK joined the criticism, saying the human cost of immigration policy was too high.

Mary Atkinson, the families together campaign officer for the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, said: “For too long, Home Office rules have discriminated against couples like Tony and Julianna, and made our right to love dependent on our income. Loving couples will do whatever it takes to be together – forcing them to suffer through years of lonely Christmases before they can start building a family life is cruel and unreasonable. The human cost of these policies is far too high.

“All of us know the importance of family, not just as Christmas but all year round. It’s only a matter of time until the Home Office recognises this too, and makes the changes that will bring families together, where they belong.

“The fact that our immigration system keeps loving couples like this one apart at Christmas because of a quibble over income should give us all pause. We can and must change these rules to make sure all of our families can stay together, where they belong. All these families are asking for is a system that treats people as human beings, not numbers – 2019 should be the year when we all say: enough is enough.”