N
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DSR 11C
4.
We shall want to ensure that British nationals with
EC rights benefit from any improved arrangements which
mav be agreed in the years ahead. It would be
politically intolerable if our people were held up while
others went through a fast channel. I have, therefore,
looked again at the proposed arrangement for British
nationals without EC rights with a view to minimising the
risk that the difficulty of distinguishing between the
CFP type passport and the CFP proper might give other
Member States a pretext for such discrimination.
5. I do not, however, think that we could contemplate
the issue of a different type of passport to UK passport
holders without EC rights. To enable them to continue
with the old-style blue hard cover passport would also
raise problems, in terms of the extra cost involved in
producing two completely different types of passport, and
the protest which would inevitably arise from some
holders of the new-style passport who would prefer to
have retained the old blue one. Politically we could not
defend a decision to issue what could be presented as a
second class passport to British nationals without EC
rights. I conclude that we should not differentiate
except by (a) no European Community marking on the cover,
and (b) an entry in the passport making it clear that the
nolder does not enjoy EC rights and that we should now
confirm the earlier decision.
/5.
With