We believe the Joint Declaration provides a secure basis for the future
of BDTCs in Hong Kong, whatever their ethnic origin and that taken
together the nationality and right of abode provisions ensure that no
one will be left after 1997 without a nationality and a place to call
their home as a result of the Joint Declaration. The nationality
provisions safeguard non-Chinese BDTCs and their dependants up to about
the middle of the next century. No doubt successive Governments would
be prepared to review the situation if circumstances up to the middle
of the next century and beyond seemed to require it. And in the unlikely
event of any British national being forced to leave Hong Kong, and having
nowhere to go, we would expect the Government of the day to consider
sympathetically whether to admit them on a case by case basis in the
light of their circumstances.
The Indian community, however, has put forward a different proposal.
They would like to be given an entitlement to British citizenship which
carries with it the right of abode in the United Kingdom. In support
of this they argue that they should have the same privilege that was
initially granted the Asian minorities in East Africa. I think perhaps
Mr Sital may have misunderstood what happened to the Asian community
in East Africa. It is true that many Asians born in East Africa retained
citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies on the independence of
various countries in that area because they did not automatically acquire
the citizenship of the newly independent country with which they had
connections. For example, some countries conferred citizenship on persons
born in the territory only if a parent was also born there. However,
those persons resident in East Africa who remained citizens of the United
Kingdom and Colonies did not as a consequence acquire the right of abode
in the United Kingdom. They will have become British Overseas citizens
on 1 January 1983, unless of course they qualified for right of abode
by reason of residence in the United Kingdom or through they themselves,
a parent or grandparent having been born, registered or naturalised here.
Similarly, under the 1971 Immigration Act most Hong Kong citizens of
the United Kingdom and Colonies did not have a sufficiently close
connection with the United Kingdom to have right of abode here. Under
the 1981 Act they became BDTCs. As BDTCS they generally have a right
of abode in their dependent territory, but have no right of abode in
the United Kingdom (since the introduction of the 1981 Act on
1 January 1983 right of abode in the United Kingdom can be acquired
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