London: A teenager is trapped in a "bureaucratic nightmare" that means she may never be able to leave the country or open a bank account — because she does not officially exist.
Aimee Rayner-Okines, 14, was not issued with a birth certificate to prove her identity due to a registering mix-up after she was born prematurely during a family trip to Spain.
The blunder has meant that she is unable to get a passport to go abroad and has even been refused a bus pass.
Her parents Steve Okines, 45, and Claire Rayner, 35, have spent their daughter's entire life trying to correct the mistake, but Spanish authorities have repeatedly refused to provide a certificate.
Premature birth
Aimee was born after her father, who was considering emigrating, went to Spain in 1997 to help friends run a bar in Denia, near Alicante.
His wife joined him when she was six months pregnant and expected to return to Britain to give birth. But she was taken to hospital after her waters broke on July 6, 1997, and Aimee was born seven weeks premature by emergency Caesarean.
Staff at the hospital asked Okines to fill in some paperwork and assured him they would take care of everything. But after the family returned to the UK they found they could not claim child benefit without a birth certificate.
— Daily Mail
