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B
C
citizens in Hong Kong.
This subject may be raised during
the Prime Minister's visit to Hong Kong so it would be good
to reply before his arrival.
4. Before the letter from Dr Leong arrived Mr Burns had already written (6 August) to the supervising Under-Secretary in the Home Office to ask if anything could be done to avoid the impression that we are effectively obliging worthwhile Hong Kong residents to uproot themselves and come to the United Kingdom before 1997. Mr Fries has
now replied. He states that Home Office policy has always been that the Home Secretary's discretion under Section 3 (1)
of the 1981 Act should be used sparingly and they are
reluctant to change their policy in this matter for the
following reasons:
(a) they do not consider this effect of the 1981 Act as
anomalous as such; a change of legislation inevitably means that people affected by that new legislation may be in a different position to those falling to be determined under
old legislation;
(b) it would be impossible to apply this discretion "quietly" to Hong Kong alone. They would have to consider
the position of other children in other parts of the world;
(c) a concession to mitigate this "anomaly" could lead
to demands for the resolution of other "anomalies";
(d) Mr Fries says he does not understand the argument that Hong Kong people affected by this anomaly consider it invidious that while only their children born after
1 January 1983 are British citizens, all minor children
(born and unborn) of beneficiaries under the 1990 Act will
become British citizens. He argues that the 1990 scheme has
its own particular rationale different to the case for minor
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