Post
by ikat » Sun May 18, 2014 11:09 pm
PR – EEA National a stay-at-home-mum,, Can husband’s income make me self-sufficient?
Hello and many thanks in advance for your help with our problem. It is a bit of a complex case so I’ll try to be as coherent as I possibly can.
I am an EEA national (A8 National) and will qualify for PR in September 2014. My husband (non-EEA, currently on a 5 yrs Family permit) will qualify one year after me, as my first year was on Workers Registration Scheme (so for him that’s an extra year before his 5yrs FP started; in that year he had “Family Member of an A8 national on the WRS” permit).
Until now, I was exercising my treaty rights. We have two children. With the first, I was on maternity leave and returned to my job after it. I then changed jobs and just before I started my new job, I got pregnant again. Our second baby is now 7 months old, and I only qualified for Maternity Allowances – this will finish in 3 weeks (beginning of June 2014). My job was on a fixed term contract, and this finished in February 2014 while I was on maternity leave. So when my Maternity Allowances finish now, I have no job to return to. I don’t actually want to go back to work as I want to be a stay at home mum and bring our children up. So for almost 3 months (June-August) I won’t be exercising my treaty rights before applying for PR this September.
My husband works and can support the whole family.
My questions are these:
1. Will I still qualify for the PR considering that for the last 3 months out of the 5yrs qualifying period I will not be in employment, self employed, study.. etc.? I do have a comprehensive medical insurance.
2. Provided I do get my PR in September…. and my husband is applying one year after me…. Will I need to prove how I was exercising my treaty rights for *his* five qualifying years, that means also the one year *after* I was already awarded my PR? Or is the fact that I already have PR enough for him to have a straightforward application?
3. If the answer to my second question is “Yes, I will have to show how I was exercising my treaty rights for the one year after having been awarded my PR”, my most important question (and the one we are stressed about the most) is this: We have two small children, my husband works, and I want to be at home bringing our children up. Does the fact that my husband makes enough money to support us (but we do get tax credits as his salary is low) enough to make me self-sufficient? Self sufficient in the terms the HO uses for the PR criteria… Meaning I am still exercising my treaty rights. Or is the fact that we do get certain benefits enough not to be self-sufficient but in a way “depended on the state”??
We are really not clear on this one… essentially what I am asking is whether my husband’s earnings can make me self-sufficient so I can in return be ‘useful’ for his PR application. I guess we’ll have to provide our bank statements and savings etc which is not a problem.
Surely we are not the first case where the EEA national is a woman who is also a mother (a stay-at-home one) and it is the non-EEA national who is the breadwinner??? I am really worried that we might be forced to “swap roles” and I will have to go back to work while he looks after the children so that I exercise my treaty rights until he is eligible to apply for PR.
Once again, thank you very much for your advice in advance, it is really appreciated.