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What is the issue that has caused anxiety this week? It is whether holders of BNSS passports would receive consular protection from the British Consulate-General in Hong Kong after 1997. People are worried that because they hold passports acquired under the BNSS rather than in any other way, that an official at the door of the Consulate would turn them away. That is not true. As far as Britain and the British Consulate are concerned, a British citizen is a British citizen, full stop. It doesn't matter how you got your passport, and officials at the Consulate will not ask that question.

It is the case and this is a matter of international law that those who hold dual nationality are not entitled to receive formal consular protection in the country or territory of their second nationality. This limitation, which Britain accepts, applies to all British citizens regardless of how they acquired their citizenship. A note about it is printed in every single British passport, including mine. But that does not mean that Britain will regard any BNSS recipient seeking consular protection at the British Consulate as automatically being a dual national. The officials at the Consulate will, I repeat, not know whether someone is a BNSS recipient from his or her passport, and they will not ask. As far as they are concerned, it is completely irrelevant. If you present yourself at the Consulate with a British citizen passport, claiming to be a solely British citizen, then the Consulate will accept that at face value and act on your behalf - unless it is presented with acceptable evidence of dual nationality, such as an SAR passport. And what if you do have dual nationality? In that case, the Consulate will not just wash its hands and turn you away. It is true that it won't be able, formally, to assist you. Note the word formally. It can and will do everything it can to help - just as Britain does today when Hong Kong residents get into difficulty, for example in China.

So, let me repeat. BNSS passport holders will get exactly the same treatment from the British Consulate whether dual nationals or not - as every single British

- passport holder around the world from Panama to Papua New Guinea. I hope that we can set those anxieties to rest.

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