Brazilian looking to come to UK... Can she get WP help?

Hi

Now, this is a long story, but here goes:

I am 24 and work in IT consultancy. I have been based in Madrid for the past 5 months, and whilst there have met a lovely lady.

Now there are a few problems:

1. She is not an EU National (Brazilian) and is in Spain on a student visa
2. Her visa is just about to run out
3. She has not been able to apply for a work permit in Spain (as her employer was unwilling to cover the litigation and costs of covering one, eventhough she is a model employee). Therefore, she has no choice but to return to Brazil at present.

We have talked about various things, and whilst I am totally unwilling to go as far as marrying her or anything like that yet, I want her (& she wants) to be able to legally work in the UK at least for a while, so she can be with me and we can see what happens.

The thing is, she is in a catch-22 situation in my opinion, as she has no work experience with a UK company, and is therefore an unknown quantity and is going to struggle to get a work permit I think.

She is intelligent and well qualified- with a degree in journalism (From Salvador, Brazil), a Masters in Spanish & Journalism (From a university in Barcelona), and a postgraduate diploma in Spanish that allows her to teach Spanish in certain countries (Obtained in Salvador, Brazil). She is also Trilingual (Spanish, English, Portuguese). She would also be able to obtain excellent references from employers in her part time jobs (as students can only do 20 hrs per week) in Spain.

However, she just misses out on any chance to qualify for the Highly Skilled Migrant Program (HSMP) according to online calculators, as she has not earned enough money in the past year and requires the English Language certificate (Her English is good though). She is also 24 by the way.

She cannot afford to be a student any more and does not want to wait in Brazil until September before she can enrole on any courses. (This is the easiest way to obtain a temporary UK visa, as it allows 1 year of study, and 1 of work, but it is simply unfordable, as UK courses are very very expensive compared to those on the continent).

Does anyone know of any agencies, schemes, programs, or anything else that such people might be able to apply for and get sponsorship for a temporary work permit? Is there anything else she can try?

Thanks for any help/ advice.

Not much really, has she any Portuguese ancestry?

Wanderer wrote:Not much really, has she any Portuguese ancestry?

Yes, but she thinks she is one generation outside qualifying.. grandfather's father.

Only thing I can suggest is try for a Work Permit in a job requiring those languages. Won't be easy tho with no real work experience.

Well if there are no other options, all I can do is see if my company will send me out to our Rio or Sao Paulo offices for a while... I guess the problem is all the skills she has can be found inside the EU. (Unless there is some company that wants specifically Brazilian Portuguese speakers or something)

Can anyone else help?

She can get excellent references from Spain if it will help.. She just needs someone to provide her with a 'foot in the door' kind of thing, and I guess I am just hoping (although maybe wasting my time) that there might be something out there that can help her with getting the WP.

Thanks