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British expatriate civil servants with wives in this category. They will soon see many of their local colleagues receive full British citizenship under the terms of the package, which will also apply to spouses. This different treatment is likely to make what has long been a minor grievance for the small number involved all the more difficult to accept. An assurance that, if the expatriate officer dies, his spouse will be admitted to the UK does not fully meet the point. If their spouses are unable to secure British citizenship in Hong Kong, the officer himself may feel under pressure to cut short his career in Hong Kong.
It is of course important that we do what we can to retain the service of experienced expatriate administrative officers, policemen and professionals in the civil service up to and beyond 1997. Their premature departure, although the numbers are not large, would add to the unsettling effect of others possibly going. Their retention is very much in the interest of both the Hong Kong Government and the United Kingdom.
I understand that under S.6(2) of the RNA, the Home Secretary is empowered to naturalise the spouse of a British citizen subject to certain conditions, one of which is a requirement that the applicant concerned has resided for a certain period in the UK. But the relevant schedule to Section 6 permits the Home Secretary to waive that requirement in cases where the applicant's spouse has been recruited to, and is serving in, certain types of Government service. The British Citizenship (Designated Services) Order 1982 indicates that service in the Government of a dependent territory is one such type of Government service. In other words there seems to be full scope under existing legislation for the Home Secretary to use his discretion sympathetically in favour of the spouses of expatriate civil servants, without a direct knock on effect outside the civil service. The number of civil servants in other colonies who might be affected is presumably miniscule: and sympathetic treatment for Hong Kong alone could be justified by reference to Hong Kong's unique circumstances. No new legislation would be required. Indeed I believe several Hong Kong spouses have already been naturalised in this way in the past.
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