This may be a controversial post to some people - I hope not.

[joebloggs]

I think there is more to this than the Telegraph reports, i think after 5yrs the conviction is spent so he could apply for citizenship then

also he has kids so he could apply to stay here using 'best interest of a child'

finally if he has committed a crime, like anyone on here, then they risk a chance of refusal - cannot have one law for one and one for another..

[Ako Si Jamie]

finally if he has committed a crime, like anyone on here, then they risk a chance of refusal

Unless he commits a heinous crime and plays the human rights card.

[CBM]

I think there is more to this than the Telegraph reports, i think after 5yrs the conviction is spent so he could apply for citizenship then

also he has kids so he could apply to stay here using 'best interest of a child'

finally if he has committed a crime, like anyone on here, then they risk a chance of refusal - cannot have one law for one and one for another..

having had a bit of time to look at this...

Clearly someone who leaves the Army as a Lance-Corporal after 13 years has not had an utterly unblemished military career and one may hazard a guess that "discipline issues" may be involved - equally one may assume that such a man has been a good soldier otherwise he would have been out.

We don't know when the offence against military discipline was committed, it may have been less than five years ago, but I also have at the back of my mind a dim recollecttion that the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act does not apply to immigration issues.

IF he had spent three years in the UK continually with his British wife and his children he would be entitled to ILR, but can you think of a serving soldier spending three whole years in the UK without a single overseas posting or tour to a war zone?

So on the whole I am sympathetic.