the
account of the extent of the person's investment in the United Kingdom,
extent to which he needs to travel on business and all other relevant
factors.
Students
14. It has been suggested that time spent in this
this country as a student
should count towards settlement and citizenship. Admission as a student does
not provide an avenue to settlement since, by definition, students are coming
here for a temporary purpose. However, if a person has nevertheless achieved
settled status and applies for citizenship, it is already the case that
periods of time spent here as a student can be counted towards meeting the
residence requirements for citizenship (see paragraphs 18-21 below). To
allow students from Hong Kong to count towards settlement time spent here
while studying would not only raise questions of fairness (paragraph 5 above)
but would also have unacceptable implications for the Government's policy of
keeping primary immigration to a minimum.
The non-ethnic Chinese community
15.
should be
The
There are an estimated 11%1⁄2 thousand non-ethnic Chinese British Dependent
Teritories citizens in Hong Kong. OMELCO has suggested that these people
granted British citizenship rather than British Overseas
citizenship if from July 1997 they would otherwise be stateless.
Government considered the arguments put forward in support of this request
but concluded that the granting of British citizenship was not justified in
the present circumstances. In response to a Parliamentary Question from
Mr Colin Moynihan, the Home Secretary stated on 23 April 1986 (0.R. Written
Answers cols 146-148) that if any British national were in the future to come
under pressure to leave Hong Kong, the Government of the day would be
expected to consider sympathetically the case for admission to the UK. This
assurance was repeated by Lord Glenarthur on 16 May 1986 in the context of a
debate on citizenship for Hong Kong ethnic minorities, and again on 23 March
1989 during the debate on the policy on the issue of British passports to
Hong Kong citizens.
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