Pensioner wins deportation fight

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An 80-year-old woman who was told she could be deported as an illegal immigrant has won her fight to remain in Scotland.

Marguerite Grimmond moved to Scotland from America in 1929 but never applied for British citizenship.

When she returned from a holiday in Australia, officials said her American passport was not valid and gave her four weeks to leave the UK.

The Home Office has now assured her she will be allowed to stay.

Mrs Grimmond, from Kirriemuir, Angus, will also have a cheque for £750 which she sent off with her application to become a naturalised British citizen refunded.

I know the weather is better in America but I am quite happy here in rainy old Scotland Marguerite Grimmond

She told the BBC Scotland News Website she was "overjoyed and relieved" after finally learning she wasn't going to be deported.

Mrs Grimmond added: "I was trying to put a brave face on things but I was a bit churned up inside at the thought that I might have to move to America because I don't know anyone there.

"I know the weather is better across there but I am quite happy here in rainy old Scotland and it is nice to know I am here legally at long last."

Mrs Grimmond said she had been "overwhelmed" by the number of letters and telephone calls of support she had received since her case was made public.

Scottish mother

She added: "I don't know why they have decided to refund the £750. I would imagine it is because I am 80 and I have never done anything wrong - nothing they know about anyway.

"I am going out for a meal with some friends to celebrate officially becoming a British citizen, although I have always thought of myself as a Scot because I have lived here for 78 years."

Mrs Grimmond was born in Detroit but moved to Arbroath with her Scottish mother when she was two.

She went on her first ever foreign holiday in May to visit her son in Sydney with husband David, only to be told when she returned to Heathrow Airport that she could not stay in the country.

Immigration officers said Mrs Grimmond should have had her passport stamped by the Home Office before she set off on her holiday, and gave her four weeks to leave.