TNAG-0660-FCO40-809-Implications-for-Hong-Kong-of-changes-in-British-nationality-1977 — Page 17

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CONFIDENTIAL

3. Timing of Act. The timing of the coming into force of a new nationality Act is even more uncertain. The Government have

no plans for early legislation; nor are they committed to the ideas published in the Green Paper for discussion. A possible time-table is as follows, although the introduction of a Bill

might well be a year or several years later.

April 1977 October 1979

January 1980

1 January 1981

Green Paper presented to Parliament.

Introduction of the Bill.

Royal Assent.

Act brought into force after the

year's preparatory work required by

the FCO and Home Office.

4. The United Kingdom's reservation on date of introduction.

of the uniform passport. The two projections above show that there could be a two-year gap between the introduction of the uniform passport by some Members of the Community and its introduction by the United Kingdom, if we delayed until after a new Act came te force. A year's delay or even 18 months might be acceptable to Community partners, given the sound explanation that we could g in the expectation that our nationality law was about to be changed However, a delay of two years or more would be likely to attract criticism from the other governments. At the last meeting of the Working Group on Passport Union in February, the British delegation. reminded the other Eight of Sir Harold Wilson's reservation on the

timing. This should be enough to preserve our position until it may be possible to discern more clearly the likely course of dis- cussions in Brussels on the uniform passport and the Government's intentions on a nationality Bill. It probably will not become

necessary to renew or withdraw the United Kingdom reservation on

the timing until late 1977.

5. Groups to whom different types of passports should be issued.

If the United Kingdom Government does not introduce the uniform

passport until after a new nationality Act is in force, the national status of the applicant under the new Act will largely determine the type of passport he should hold. Those persons who would be United Kingdom nationals for European Community purposes should logically hold uniform passports. It would be necessary to amend the United Kingdom declaration made at the time of

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