TNAG-1382-FCO40-1830-Future-of-Hong-Kong-nationality-and-citizenship-1985 — Page 182

CONFIDENTIAL

the line in the House of Commons at the Committee

February that:

Stage on 6

be

"The proposal that children born after 30 June 1997 to non-Chinese

former BDTCs should acquire BOC status automatically at birth if

they would otherwise be stateless is intended to apply to the first

post-1997 generation.

However, we appreciate that there may

concern about potential statelessness arising among subsequent

generations of non-Chinese Hong Kongers.

It would not be

appropriate as a general principle to grant British nationality

indefinitely and without restrictions to the descendants of British

nationals. However, problems of further generations and potential

into are looking here

the next

being urgently examined in response to representations made by the

non-Chinese community in Hong Kong." Lady Young said much the same

in the Lords, adding that we should probably need to discuss the

statelessness

-

and

we

matter with the Chinese.

century

-

are

B

137

4.

be

Our initial view at official level, which we put to Hong Kong,

was that we should not grant BOC status to the second and subsequent

generations. If we agreed to this, it would

hard to know where

to draw the line, and we could not agree to the indefinite

transmissibility fo

fo BOC status without undermining the basis of the

Persons who had been settled

in what would by then have been

minimum of some twenty years should look to

China rather than the UK if they were in danger of being stateless.

We proposed that Ministers should take the line:

BNA.

part of China for a

seek to ensure that

(a) that we intended to approach the Chinese

it is possible for the children of BOCs born in Hong Kong to obtain Chinese Nationality;

(b)

is that

in

cases where it

i s

that the view of Ministers

genuinely impossible for such people to obtain Chinese nationality,

and they would otherwise be stateless, there would be a strong case

for British Ministers of the day to consider using the discretionary

power under Section 27 of the BNA to grant BOC status to minors on

an individual basis.

CONFIDENTIAL