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PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT BRITISH
This report is primarily concerned with the impact of British nationality law on the future of people in Hong Kong, and not on Britain's overall responsibility for the territory and its inhabitants. For that reason, it concentrates on those who now hold British nationality and whose future security could be enhanced by changes in nationality law. But British nationality and immigration policy also affects some of the non-British nationals whose only home is in Hong Kong.
About 2 million of Hong Kong's 51⁄2 million people emigrated from China. Though theoretically recognised by China as Chinese nationals, they do not at present have any internationally recognised citizenship status and use their Hong Kong certificates of identity for travel as though they were stateless. Some of those recent immigrants wish to naturalise and become British (they would thus become British Dependent Territories citizens). But that process is much more difficult in Hong Kong than it is in Britain. The criteria for granting nationality in Hong Kong (length of residence, language and good character) are the same as those in Britain, and the Hong Kong authorities claim that they are operated in the same way as in the UK, and as laid down by the British Home Office. Yet, while only 9.4% of British naturalisation applications were refused in 1983,48 over 50% of those applying in Hong Kong are rejected. In fact the proportion of refusals is even higher if those applying on the basis of marriage to a Hong Kong resident are excluded: since 1983, 1007 others have applied for British nationality, and only 237 have so far been granted it (some will, of course, still be under consideration)." We were told by senior civil servants who sit on the naturalisation board that the majority of people are refused on the 'good character' requirement, and by another informant that in Hong Kong it is necessary for applicants to prove why they want to be British, and not for the
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