AN American man living in the Highlands with his Scottish wife and daughter – and who is at the centre of a visa battle with the Home Office – says nothing will change until Scotland is independent and able to decide its own immigration policy.

Scott Johnson was speaking as Jason and Christy Zielsdorf and their five children were thought to be heading back to Canada after giving up their community lifeline store in Laggan, and as Russell Felber and his lawyer attended a hearing in Edinburgh to put to a judge his and his wife’s case to remain in Inverness.

Johnson – who lives near Tain, Ross-shire with wife Nicola and Lauryn, their daughter – has been battling to remain in Scotland since the family arrived back here two years ago. He is currently awaiting a decision on whether or not he can appeal against the refusal of his leave to remain.

He told The National: “I feel real heavy in my heart at what’s happening to all these people and I feel like I’m the next one on the plank. But I’m never going to allow it to come down to that. I won’t let that happen to my family.

“I think it warps people, it warps children and I won’t allow it to happen, I have my family to think about. I don’t think anything is going to change until this country has independence and can decide who stays here. It’s like it doesn’t matter what happens to Canadians, or Australians – whatever Westminster says is what’s going to happen.”

Dr Paul Monaghan took up the Johnsons’ case with Immigration Minister Robert Goodwill.

He wrote to him after they had discussed it at Westminster and after UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) had suggested that family move to the US.

In his letter he set out in detail the steps Johnson had taken to formalise his stay in Scotland, adding: “Mr and Mrs Johnson have no desire to live in the United States and furthermore wish for their daughter, who is settled in school and the local community, to grow up in the country of her birth. I find it completely unacceptable that UKVI would argue that residents of Scotland should move to the United States for no good reason and attempt to justify that argument on an incorrect conclusion based upon a cursory examination of the case facts.

“Mr Johnson is a qualified teacher, he is an active member of his local rural community, and he is more than able to support himself and his family financially. He is an example of the positives of immigration… and I am at a loss to explain why your department cannot simply review the circumstances of the case and come to a reasonable judgement based on the objective facts.”

Monaghan told The National: “Robert Goodwill obviously hasn’t bothered reading my letter – he’s just given it to a civil servant who has gone to UKVI and we get the same reply back. We’ve had this reply before and it’s outrageous to suggest that the couple were never married. It’s obvious that they were, it’s obvious they were in a co-habiting and subsisting relationship. All of the facts are completely ignored.

“Part of the problem is the UKVI service changes the rules on a weekly basis. The bottom line is that nobody knows actually what the rules are because they are changing so frequently and being updated.

“I have other constituents who have links to Romania who have been given forms and then been told by UKVI that the forms are not valid because they were changed the previous week, despite the fact the couple received the forms from UKVI the week before that.”

In the letter signed by Goodwill, he referred to the heart attack Johnson suffered when he arrived in Glasgow in May 2015. The fact that he applied to remain from inside the UK was cited as one reason for the rejection of the application.

Goodwill wrote: “I am sorry to hear that Mr Johnson suffered a heart attack but the Home Office refusal letter explains that America has a health care system which Mr Johnson can gain access too [sic] if he requires further cardiology care… In light of the above, I do not thnk [sic] a meeting would be helpful at this stage.”