Victory at last for Peterborough chef after 20-year fight against deportation with the Home Office despite arriving legally

Saiful Islam, a chef from Peterborough, has spoken of his relief after finally winning a 20-year battle with the Home Office to remain in the UK.

Mr Islam arrived in the country from Bangladesh, on a valid work permit, in January 2003.

Since then, he has had to put up with facing attempts to be deported on false pretences in 2005.

Also, he’s experienced incomplete evidence used against him in court – due to part of his file being destroyed – and had his file mixed up with that of a sex offender with the same name.

Despite a senior judge recognising a series of major errors from the Home Office in the handling of his case, he was still facing deportation in 2021 after being denied a judicial review because he was neither in employment nor in receipt of a valid work permit.

This was despite Mr Islam arguing he was unable to work because the Home Office has held onto his passport since 2008.

Fighting the case took its toll on Mr Islam, causing him to be diagnosed with depression and causing him difficulty to sleep, which he says he still suffers with today.

Previously, he told the Peterborough Telegraph: “The Home Office’s mistakes have seriously affected my life - mentally and physically and through lost employment. I have been treated worse than a dog.”

Now, however, after 20 years and seven months of campaigning, which has included letters to the Prime Minister, the Home Secretary, members of the House of Lords alongside street protests in London with a loud speaker and the support of five Peterborough MPs, Mr Islam has finally been given leave to remain in the country.

He said: “I still feel sad but this shows that honesty always wins and honesty gives you power.

“I did nothing wrong, I came here legally, I respect British laws and the British people and I have so many of them to thank for supporting my campaign to get me to this point.

"Honesty is the best policy. There was no chance I was going to give up, I was determined to prove with all my efforts that I had done nothing wrong.”

Mr Islam moved to Peterborough in 2012 and lived in Eastfield Road.

During this time, he volunteered feeding the homeless at the Brewery Tap car park in Westgate but was unable to work despite having a job offer from a restaurant in Millfield because, he claims, the Home Office had held onto his passport.

In 2020, The Home Office apologised to him and offered him £5,000 in compensation for its numerous blunders.

Incredibly, the department also tried to deport him after falsely claiming that he had not received a re-entry stamp on his passport when returning from a visit to Bangladesh.

The stamp was present, but an official failed to show it in court after photocopying the wrong part of his passport.

It was only when Mr Islam received a copy of his passport two years later that he discovered the re-entry stamp was indeed present.

Mr Islam, who has an eight-year-old daughter, was offered £6,000 in compensation but has turned this offer down so his fight continues.

He added: “I’m still very upset at the Home Office. I can’t ever get the time I spent fighting this or my health back. I have suffered unfairly due to careless actin and system failure.

"I am worried as I know this could happen to others and I know other people suffering while having to deal with the Home Office. I, and everyone else, deserve to have my rights respected. The worry if that most people spend 20 years fighting this, like me.”

Mr Islam is now looking forward to the future and to pushing ahead with plans to open a new restaurant.

Peterborough MP Paul Bristow said: “After 20 years and seven months of campaigning, Saiful Islam finally achieved leave to remain in the UK.

"This is after the Home Office lost his documents, photographed his passport incorrectly- saying he was missing stamps saying that he came to the UK legally and mixed up his records with a convicted criminal.

"It has take hundreds of letters and emails, five different MPs for Peterborough, national and local media coverage, scored of solicitors and campaigners, meetings with ministers but you finally did it, well done Saiful Islam.