HONG KONG NATIONALITY WHITE PAPER
BRIEFING NOTES
1.
TREATMENT OF NON-ETHNIC CHINESE AND FORMER SERVICEMEN
1. HMG SHOULD GRANT BRITISH CITIZENSHIP TO NON-ETHNIC CHINESE BDTCs WHO
HAVE NO OTHER NATIONALITY
A M
B
The granting of British citizenship is unnecessary to provide a citizenship
status for people in Hong Kong who would otherwise be stateless. British
Overseas citizenship provides an entirely adequate and fitting citizenship
status. Neither status can provide a right of abode in Hong Kong. That is
guaranteed under the Joint Declaration. A separate right of abode elsewhere
is therefore not necessary.
The detailed arguments are:
a) the provisions in Article 6 fully reflect the undertakings given during
the passage of the Hong Kong Bill. These were that no former BDTC,
nor any children born after 30 June 1997 to such a person, will become
stateless as a result of the agreement. This was extended to cover
the grandchildren of former Hong Kong BDTCs, if they were born stateless.
b)
Right of abode in Hong Kong can only be provided by the Government
until 30 June 1997. After that date, it will be a matter for the Chinese.
But the agreement with the Chinese guarantees rights of
abode in Hong Kong after 1997. The Government believe that these provisio
will cover all non-ethnic Chinese BDTCs in Hong Kong, unless they have
left Hong Kong permanently to settle elsewhere and have right of abode
somewhere else.
c)
Nationality without right of abode in the parent country is not, as
has been suggested in some quarters, a form of statelessness. PDTCs
do not now have the right of abode in the United Kingdom. The Council's
proposals would undermine the principles of the British Nationality
Act 1981, which was to confer on all former citizens of the United Kingdom
and Colonies a status which would accurately reflect their links with
the United Kingdom or with a dependent territory or former dependency
as the case may be.
D.1.1