TNAG-0901-FCO40-1111-Implications-for-Hong-Kong-of-changes-in-British-nationality-1979 — Page 133

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should be able to transmit their citizenship to children ham abroad, but that transmission should generally be confined to the first generation so born... These proposals were not unprecedented. In May 1975 a committee of the Society of Conservative Lawyers produced a paper entitled "Towards a New Citizenship", which made suggestions that foreshadowed the Green Paper, but which also proposed that each dependency should confer its own citizenship (such as "citizenship of Hong Kong" and "citizenship of Gibraltar") while reserving the expression "British Overseas citizenship" to those associated with former dependencies.

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CONSTRAINTS UPON REFORM

It should not be surprising that the suggestions made by a number of commentators, including the authors of the Green Paper, have coincided. Any scheme for the reform of nationality law, in order to command political and legal acceptability, must satisfy several criteria.

a)

The scheme must establish mutually exclusive categories so as to distinguish between the people of dependencies and those of the United Kingdom. Unless it does so it will1 fail to identify a group upon whom Parliament can be expected to confer the right of entry to the U.K. and the other rights associated with citizenship.

b)

It must not impose statelessness on anyone.

c)

d)

Any scheme for the revision of our nationality law must be simple to understand, and straightforward to administer.

The new scheme must constitute a consolidation of all legislation not otherwise replaced, in order to achieve the objective of providing a single, comprehensive enactment.

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It must take account of international relations. particular it may be necessary to make temporary arrangements which avoid creating separate citizenship of dependences where this may unnecessarily prejudice current negotiations, as in Gibraltar or the Falkland Islands.

The reform should take account of some of the changes in society and in family law that have taken place since the passage of the British Nationality Act 1948. These include more general acceptance of the principle of equality of spouses in matters like authority over children of a marriage and a change in attitudes to illegitimacy.

e)

and Highey!

f)

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BRITISH SUBJECTHOOD

These demands, and particularly the demand for simplicity, lead to the conclusion that the status of "British subject" (or "Commonwealth citizen") should be abolished.

A decision by Parliament at Westminster to abolish that status would not, of course, affect the nationality laws of other sovereign and independent countries in the Commonwealth. Most of those countries,