Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

I am grateful to noble Lords for raising this issue concerning the former colony of Hong Kong. I join the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, and others in commending the endurance of the noble Lord, Lord Avebury, and his commitment to end what he sees as an injustice. However, I am afraid that I must resist these amendments as we believe that British National (Overseas) citizens, who gained that status from a connection with Hong Kong, and British overseas citizens resident in Hong Kong are already fully catered for within British nationality legislation. We also believe that associated provisions in law to prevent the statelessness of those persons, and their children, formerly resident in Hong Kong are sufficiently comprehensive as to make statutory change unnecessary. Section 4B of the British Nationality Act 1981 was introduced in 2003 to benefit particular categories of persons because of the historical implications of the break-up of the British Empire. It is our position that it would not be appropriate to extend this to further groups. The status of British National (Overseas) was introduced to cover those British dependent territories citizens from Hong Kong who may not have acquired Chinese citizenship when sovereignty was transferred to China in 1997. This status was provided for under the British Nationality (Hong Kong) Order 1986. Those who could not register as a British National (Overseas) could become a British overseas citizen if they would otherwise be stateless. This also applied to their children if they would otherwise be stateless following the partition of Hong Kong. The Government at the time recognised that there may be some who would not become Chinese citizens after the handover, and so also provided in the British Nationality (Hong Kong) Act 1997 for those British nationals who were ordinarily resident in Hong Kong both on the date of application and immediately before 4 February 1997 to become British citizens. The Government accept that there may be some who cannot benefit under this provision, as they have not maintained ordinary residence in Hong Kong. These people, however, having established themselves elsewhere in the world through choice, will have a route to another citizenship. Section 4B of the British Nationality Act 1981 was introduced following the abolition of the special voucher scheme to allow those who would have been eligible to come to the UK under that scheme from East African countries, had it continued, to do so as a British citizen following their registration. We do not intend to extend the registration provisions of Section 4B to British Nationals (Overseas). Most of them will already have a right of abode in Hong Kong or elsewhere. This contrasts with the difficulties faced by other types of British nationals around the world, many of whom do not have a right of abode in any other country. Presumably the people that noble Lords wish to include, apart from those I have already stated, are those who have not maintained a link with Hong Kong through ordinary residence and, therefore, may not be able to register. The majority of unsuccessful applicants under the 1997 Act are currently from people with a Nepalese connection who are not living in Hong Kong. This is because they do not meet the requirement of being ordinarily resident in Hong Kong, which is critical to registration under the 1997 Act. In the 12 years since that Act was passed, it could be argued that such people had the opportunity to settle elsewhere and acquire citizenship and thereby are not stateless. This includes the possibility of acquiring British citizenship or another nationality by naturalisation on the basis of residence. Amendment 96 also proposes to enable British overseas citizenship to be acquired by a person born stateless to a parent who held British Dependent Territories citizenship before 1 July 1997, and therefore to a parent who neither acquired British National (Overseas) citizenship by registration or British overseas citizenship under Article 6(2) of the relevant order. This would in effect mean that any person born stateless to a parent who had a connection with Hong Kong when it was a British dependent territory could register as a British overseas citizen. We do not believe there to be many children born to former British Dependent Territories citizens in Hong Kong who have not acquired another nationality.