Ukrainian refugees in Northamptonshire say visa process for children is 'a torture'
Watch Sarah Cooper's report for ITV News Anglia
Families who have escaped the fighting in Ukraine have said trying to get visas for their children is a "torture" as they criticised the process for being too complicated.
They are calling for children to be fast-tracked through the process provided their parents have the correct documentation to come to the UK.
Zhanna and her daughter Daria, who turns 13 next week, left Ukraine on 4 March. Just five days later the house they had been staying in, Zhanna's childhood home near Zhytomyr, was bombed.
They are now living with Zhanna's cousin Valentina Potter at her home in Northamptonshire.
Mrs Potter said if they had waited for visas they would not be here now.
She said: "Four days after they left, their house was obliterated and they only arrived to the UK [on Tuesday]. Their paperwork has been approved on Tuesday, so if she waited for approvals, she would not be arriving now - she would be dead."
There are 13 of them living in the Northamptonshire house at the moment.
Mrs Potter said she was spending hours every day applying for visas.
She and her sister Slava Trach said they were doing it as the families have been through enough escaping their war-torn homeland.
She said Ukrainian children should be fast-tracked through the system to get families out of danger.
Mrs Potter said: "A lot of children don't have passports, because if you're a young child, especially coming through the era of Covid - nobody was going anywhere, nobody applied for passports, all they have is a birth certificate.
"You can still get a child here with just a birth certificate, but it's so much more complicated and takes so much more time.
"Let's say you've got an adult, whose paperwork is all intact, but the child only has a birth certificate - they get delayed by three weeks and have to travel to Warsaw - apply, apply again, come back for visas - and it's just draining people of time and money that they don't have."
The Home Office has received nearly 60,000 applications from people fleeing the war, but so far fewer than half have been issued a visa.Tens of thousands of British people have applied to open their homes to Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion.
Yet only one visa for every 10 refugees applying under the Homes For Ukraine scheme has been granted.
The Home Office said: "We are moving as quickly as possible to ensure that those fleeing Ukraine can find safety in the UK through the Ukraine Family Scheme and Homes for Ukraine.
"We have streamlined the process so valid passport holders do not have to attend in-person appointments before arriving in the UK, simplified our forms and boosted caseworker numbers, while ensuring vital security checks are carried out."
But Mrs Potter is angry those checks are being carried out on small children.
"What checks are they doing on a one-and-a-half-year-old child?", she asked.
"What checks are they doing on a six-year-old child? What checks are they doing on a nine-year-old child? I understand that the checks need to be done, but if their adult has the paperwork in tact and the checks been done on them, what checks are they going to do on small children?"