02/03/2017 Timeline

Should you automatically be allowed to live in the UK

if your partner is a British citizen?

And how new research into the care of premature babies can save lives.

Laura's stepping in for Shereen for this week.

And I'm looking forward to hearing what you've been

which we'll see a little later in the show.

That's right, and comedian Jo Brand has been talking

mental health and her father's struggle with depression.

I was frightened of him. It's quite a weird ring being frightened of

your own dad and it took him years to seek help.

But first - when Gordon and Sarah Brown's baby Jennifer died

after being born prematurely, Sarah made it her mission to help

It's more common than you might think.

So let's take a look at the numbers at the screen.

60,000 babies in the UK will be born prematurely each year -

so before the 37th week of pregnancy.

20% of babies born prematurely will die in their first month,

but even if they survive they're at increased risk of developing

That's where neonatal units come in - they're specially set up

We've got 15 neonatal units here in Scotland.

Sarah Brown set up a research laboratory in Jennifer's name

at one of those neonatal units, in Edinburgh.

Along with Catherine Smith whose daughter was saved by research

carried out by the unit. We've looked at areas around infection,

around consequences for babies born to early, with brain development and

eyesight development, which are the very last to develop. We've also

looked at oxygen levels around neonatal units. That have to look

after babies born very early need to mimic the same environment as the so

babies can keep those last few weeks of development to go home a bit and

healthy. Oxygen level in those incubators is absolutely critical.

Our laboratory has been a key player in investigating that. It's a

sophisticated environment that needs a lot of knowledge and data and we

have been contributing to that knowledge. Have you any idea how

many lives might have been saved as a result of the research? Absolutely

not and I don't suppose we ever will but we know that babies that need to

be cared for in a special care unit, maybe a quarter of babies in the

country will need a small amount of time, they will need that extra

support and babies born very early will have an extended stay and need

a lot of looking after. Catherine, you have reason to be grateful for

this research. What happened when your baby was born? She was very

small. She was 750 grams, she went into the sort of care that Sarah as

described, an incubator. When you are sitting beside her everyday,

just looking, because that is all you can do. Realising the incredibly

careful control of the oxygen which is being monitored by a machine, it

had been changed recently and was improved because of the research lab

and it was incredibly meaningful. Catherine wrote to you and Gordon.

What did she say in her letter? Her letter arrived and Gordon opened it

and shared it. She said that Allah had arrived and was driving and they

were looking forward to her going home in the near future. It makes me

very proud that our lab -- Ella. It makes me very proud that our lab has

helped with that. It is very important for babies in the future.

You looked into the incubator where your baby was. Anxious times to see

her improve. What is that experience like? It's pretty difficult. At some

point you come to realise that it might be OK and it happens

gradually. That is what happened with Ella. She had a slow and steady

progress which was easier than a lot of other experiences where there are

a lot of emergencies and difficulties. There are a lot of

stories. The majority, from my experience, do not have the sort of

happy ending that minded. That is happening right beside you. That is

when you start to get passionate about the work that Sarah is doing

because while the care from my perspective was incredible, I can't

believe that they saved. I still can't believe it. But they save all

the babies. 15 years on, I don't imagine you can ever get over the

loss of a child. How did you reflect on that? Our baby Jennifer was born

early and we had a precious ten days with that and thanks to the

extraordinary care that we received from the NHS nurses and midwives

around us, we were able to have those days. That is very precious to

ours. But the loss is very deep and will be with as always. We have two

amazing songs but we also have Jennifer in our hearts. More than

that, the work that goes through the Jennifer Brown research lab is very

important. If you've been affected by any

of the issues we've been discussing and would like details

of organisations which offer advice and support you can go

online Or you can call free

any time to hear recorded so we've been asking you to tell us

what you've been reading. Lots of really interesting tweets

from you - this from Holly, who said she's reading "anything

by Diana Gabladon - love her books." The badger is waiting for a people's

tragedy, the Russian Revolution. Well done to you.

JD Robertson is currently reading Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi -

which he says is a very well written book

with a different perspective on slavery.

What have you been reading? I read The Girl On The Train and I am about

to read a book about American first ladies.

The famous Glasgow gangster Jimmy Boyle

was called "Scotland's most dangerous man"

at one point in the '60s and '70s.

And the story of his marriage to Sara Trevelyan made

They tied the knot when Jimmy was out on day release,

during his prison sentence for murder.

Sara has written a book about what happened once Jimmy left

Turn the clock back a bit. How did you to get together in the first

base? I read his book. A Sense Of Freedom an extraordinary achievement

that he had it published when still in prison. As a consequence of that

and my interest in prison, I ended up visiting him in the Barlinnie

special unit. We probably wouldn't have seen each other again if we

hadn't been working in therapeutic communities as a junior doctor. I

was working at a hospital call a link to an -- called Ingleton in the

Borders. It was a therapeutic community contact within the prison.

Then I met Jimmy for a second time and he invited me to visit. Which I

did. Well, the rest is history. We obviously it it off. What was your

life like as a couple together? You were under a lot of scrutiny. We

went through many phases. The first part of our marriage, Jimmy was in a

special unit. Conditions in the unit were very exceptional and they

allowed prisoners to have relationships with families in a way

that was quite remarkable in terms of the rest of the prison system. It

was looked on as important in prison rehabilitation. Then he was sent

back to the mainstream system to be tested. The visiting requirement

there was an hour a month. From being able to see him every day it

was a genetic change. That wasn't an easy time. Then he was eventually

released and we needed to decide what we were going to do together.

We ended up establishing this centre in Edinburgh called the Gateway

exchange. We needed to have somewhere where people leaving

institutions could go to. Due believe there is enough

rehabilitation in the system now? We know that everybody in the system

has potential and we wanted to put the emphasis on realising that

potential. To some extent, the Scottish prisons are changing. They

are very different than they were at that time but there is still a lot

more that can be done to encourage that potential and support prisoners

when they come out of prison. How long did you and Jimmy have together

and why did you split up? We had 20 years together and that is a good

length of relationship these days. We had a good marriage for the most

part but we came from very different backgrounds and overtime that

started to tell and we were going in different directions. Do you keep in

touch? I still have occasional contact with him. He has read the

book. He said it was well-written and he said that I could have

written more about the good times. He spoke for many things in his life

and he said he wished he fought more for me. Why did you write it?

Initially, for our children who had only known their father out of

prison. I wanted them to know it from my own experience. Then people

thought it had a wider significance and that is why it is in the form of

a book and I'll be putting it out. Thank you very much for coming to

talk to us. Coming up in a bit, we'll be hearing

from another author - But she's not the only star

in Scotland this week. Actors Robert Downey Jr

and Scarlett Johansson are coming to Cumbernauld,

to film their new Avengers movie. The town has won the

Carbuncle award twice. We asked some locals

what they should do If they want to go sightseeing,

there's some questionable architecture. You can go from walk.

The stables. A nice walk. My spear. The cafe upstairs is amazing. The

lodge is quite nice. I'm sure they would like to go to some pubs that

have just opened. The restaurants and clubs in Glasgow. There's

nowhere in common all. Burger King, KFC, McDonald's. Other than that,

Wetherspoon 's. The Wetherspoon is at the very end is nice and it is

not expensive. The hotel is a nice relaxed atmosphere. I don't actually

stay in common old is a roller disco opened up. -- in

You might remember this from last week's show we spoke

to Tristan and Finlay, the two lads from Dundee

whose video of them doing yoga in kilts went viral.

It has now had over 48 million views.

Well, a little bit later we will see the work of two

Edinburgh tour guides, Cameron and Bill, whose parody

video is also proving a bit of a sensation.

I'm not sure what to say about that but it inspired you to go to yoga. I

went to my first class this week but I have a bit of a shoulder injury.

Imagine you come to the UK to work or study, meet someone you love,

get married and make plans to live happily ever after.

If one of you is from outside the EU though, it may not be

Robert and Adam married two years ago, but are now living

We met in a bar in Glasgow. We hit it off pretty quickly. I first came

to the UK to study veterinary medicine at the University of

Glasgow. I was on my student Visa when we decided to get married. We

spoke to the Home Office in March 2015. Three months before we got

married. After graduation, I called up and after three hours of

conversations, someone came back and said which form to use. There was a

long period of waiting for that. Six months. Eventually through speaking

to our local MP, she got a response from the Home Office. They said it

looked to be the wrong paperwork. Two weeks later, we got the official

letter from the Home Office saying it was the wrong application and it

was rejected. I found the whole office very disorganised. The Home

Office don't like to give information out. We got the final

decision letter in the middle of December. We sought legal advice.

They said we would need to apply right away using a different

application form. Because it was over 28 days from when the letter

was dated, I was technically and overstay and I had no status in the

UK. I believe the basic premise was if you don't allow this person to

remain with their spouse in the UK, your breaking up an existing family

life. Lawyers said because he had no status and was past the 28 day

window, that was the only form that was left to us. We were never told I

had to leave. Within the six-month processing time. The lawyers said

that it had been rejected. The explanation was weird. The points

they brought up soon and prejudice things, like the fact we don't have

a child. Adam does not have citizenship. They said that even

though we got married, there is no guarantee would have been allowed to

stay and I shouldn't have applied. We had to go through background

checks to get married. The rejection letter said it was not an

unsurmountable obstacle for me to move to America. They are suggesting

a British citizen should leave the country because they have decided to

reject an American spouse's application. There is a lot of

uncertainty in the LGBT community in America. We have a lot of

protections against that in the UK. It was very stressful. I have had

problems in the past with stress alopecia. Eyelashes and eyebrows. It

started happening again. The stress was building up. It affected us as a

couple. There would be times where we would be Thames with each other.

It was like a constant weight for a result on something. Never-ending.

So is the immigration process as simple and

We asked the Home Office for a statement and we await their answer.

It costs ?1,195 to apply for a family visa, with no

Last year, nearly 65,000 people applied for a visa to live

permanently in the UK, for all sorts of reasons,

Of those, 6,500 people were granted a family visa,

so to live with a family member in the UK.

But look at that drop from 2015 - a 60% fall.

So are people being put off applying to live

Let's talk it over with the human rights lawyer Aamer Anwar.

What do you make of the individual case? Very sad. Inhumane. The Home

Office decision is arbitrary. There is no rhyme or reason. Sadly it is

yet an example of thousands of other individuals, couples and families

who face similar treatment. Surely people watching must be thinking, if

you're married to a UK citizen, you should be able to live in this

country with no issue. The Home Office changed the rules in 2012.

They introduced a whole series of rules, one of which was that they

plucked a figure from the sky and said you had to be earning a minimum

of ?18,600. In order to be able to have this spouse stay in the

country. The argument was the spies should not be a burden on taxpayers.

Prior to that, you were not allowed to claim benefits anyway. 99.9% of

these couples and families are law-abiding and have gone through

the rules and tried to apply the rules. But for some reason the Home

Office refuses their right to stay in the country and the breaking up

families left, right and centre. In this case we are talking about a vet

who earns well. It seems to be arbitrary decisions taken by

faceless officials. The rank hypocrisy from that case in the

United States, for our Home Office officials to see the British citizen

should leave and go to the United States, up sticks and just go and

stay another government. But we're not willing to take somebody who has

been working here, living here aren't working and is willing to pay

their taxes. The bottom line here is quite simply the UK Government

doesn't want British citizens to marry foreigners. They can't stop

that happening, so they don't want them to settle with spaces in this

country. They want the British citizen to leave this country, then

so be it because it meets ill-advised immigration targets.

Thank you very much for coming in. You're welcome. Thank you.

The comedian Jo Brand has been in Glasgow this week,

ahead of Comic Relief's Red Nose Day.

She met volunteers at See Me, the charity which supports people

with mental health issues, and compered a comedy gig

John Beattie went along for Timeline, and started by asking

about the funding Red Nose Day gives to See Me.

Comic Relief is helping to fund this project. Almere at the Scottish

Association of mental health, we met some young people who have been

through the project and received support. The passing on their

experience and helping to put together plans which will encourage

teenagers who also are similar problems and find it difficult to

talk about them to go further and get support. I read up about you

beforehand. I hope it was all good! Did you read about my spell as Miss

world, spreading peace and love? What did you read? Father, like my

father, would sit quietly for a while and then had terrible

tantrums. Has that formed you? The fact that your father would go off

the handle? It had a huge impact on my life. When I was a teenager and

my father's depression was severe but he was too ashamed to seek any

help for it, he had the most appalling temper. The entire family

tiptoed around him. I was frightened of them. It's quite a weird thing,

being frightened of your own dad. It took him years to seek help. I think

he was worried about what people at work would think of them whether he

would lose his job. This was kind of the 1960s and 70s. Are very

different time. You have this unenviable role of making people

laugh. Can you bring a lot of mental health issues into humour? Is that

half? I think you can. Somebody asked me recently, are there any

subject in comedy that are taboo? I don't think they are. It depends on

your attitude towards them. Race, culture, sexuality, anything really.

It is all dependent on what your attitude is. When I talk about

mental health, I try and see it from the side of People's ignorance

really because the one thing that worries me is people know so little

about it. They are frightened of it. They don't really know what it

means, they tend to get drawn in by the sort of tabloid portrayal of it,

which is always, let's be honest, for our entertainment rather than to

educate his. They tend to make people with mental health problems

like murderous, monstrous or comical. There is a huge drive

nowadays for people to talk about this. Thinking back your days as a

psychiatric nurse... They do talk about it now. My daughters go on the

YouTube and watch videos of those who have anxiety, depression,

anorexia. A lot of them speak openly about this. It helps girls of this

age a lot, seeing other people having similar problems. Listening

to their advice can only be helpful. Scotland is the only country that

doesn't have a counselling service for youngsters who are experiencing

these problems. This is a terrible thing to say, but in England we

virtually don't either. It comes back to prioritising how you spend

your money. I think the problem is that our government has certainly

cut mental health services to the bone. And particularly adolescent

mental health services are virtually nonexistent. To the extent that you

are finding kids who need to be admitted have to travel 200 miles to

find somewhere with a bed. If you are referred for counselling, nine

months later you still haven't seen anybody. I know it is easy to say

throw some more money at it, but to some extent that is the answer

because you just need more people doing the job. I really enjoyed you

walking all those miles for Comic Relief. Did you think I was nice and

cheerful? ! It was grim. I started every day with a cheery smile and a

happy heart. Walking 14 hours a day is really hard. I could do it fairly

easily if people didn't talks to me. But unfortunately people would come

up and try to spur me on. I wanted to bottle then, I'm not joking. I

was so grumpy by the end of it. I tried my best. I think I only told

one person to... Off in the whole week. Thank you for coming. Have a

great night. Nice to meet you. Thank you very much.

That's almost it for us this week here on Timeline.

You can let us know what you want us to follow up, through our Facebook

and Twitter timelines, or you can email us

But, before we go - two Edinburgh tour guides have

done their own kilted yoga video, after the viral sensation of Tristan

and Finlay from Dundee got nearly 50 million hits.

Pittodrie Stadium is the venue for Scottish Cup quarterfinal action.

Partick Thistle travel to the Granite City

with a place in the semifinals at stake.