First step but by immigration not Elite office. The Elite office are fine with it as they sent my application off for me. It's the dick heads at immigration who are turning us all down.
Exactly. The general thought is that immigration want us find other ways of staying here that will involve them getting lots of bribes (cash). They all survive on corruption money.
Because most, if not all, previous volunteer visa holders have been blacklisted from obtaining the Elite. I was told it was still worth a try but failed.