TNAG-0901-FCO40-1111-Implications-for-Hong-Kong-of-changes-in-British-nationality-1979 — Page 83

Ireland efore taking a final decision.

4. There are, however, a number of matters in the proposed

Nationality Bill on which the Home Office and the Foreign and

Commonwealth Office disagree and it is essential that these

should be resolved before the Bill is put to the Home Affairs

Committee. The most difficult for us is the proposal for a two-

tier system of citizenship to which a number of dependent

You may have been

territories have raised strong objections.

given an indication of the depth of feeling on citizenship in

some of the remaining colonies during the recent visit to the

Home Office by the Governor of Hong Kong. Although each of

the territories concerned Hong Kong, Gibraltar and the

M

Falkland Islands are the main ones

claims to be a special

case, there are important political implications to be taken

into consideration and it is essential that we get it right

otherwise our relations will suffer, not only with the

dependencies concerned but also with their neighbouring

countries. We believe that a three-tier system of citizenship

on the lines of that proposed by the Governor of Hong Kong,

will go a long way towards resolving our problems and we

should like to pursue this further. We are also uneasy about

some of the other provisions, including the future of British

Subject status, the implications of transmission of citizen-

ship by descent for one generation only and the narrow

limitation of the Crown Servants' definition (for example,

some of the British Council staff whom you exclude actually

hold diplomatic rank in our Missions).

5. There is, in addition, the problem of the UKPH from East

Africa to whom it is not intended to give British Citizenship

because "the resulting immigration commitment would be quite

This conflicts with the present practice of

unacceptable".

CONFIDENTIAL

/permitting