TNAG-1383-FCO40-1831-Future-of-Hong-Kong-nationality-and-citizenship-1985 — Page 117

E.R.

RELATED PASSPORT MATTERS

12. A number of points were raised:

(a) Fees and Costs

BN(0) passports were to be issued in Hong Kong at the discretion of the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary. This suggested

therefore that the fee would have to be levied under the Consular Fees Act 1980 and not under any Hong Kong regulations. FCO would have to advise how the issuing in Hong Kong was to be paid for and the implications for the fee. A fee for BN(0) passports which differed from other standard passport fees would not be appropriate nor would it be defensible for the fee to vary around the world save for reasons of currency exchange. A major concern for the Home Office was the effect on their PES and Memorandum Trading Account if they had to meet the cost of some 3 million passports at around £4.2 million over a 10 year period. At present, Home Office met the cost of the comparatively small number of passports issued by FCO.

There appeared to be the expectation in Hong Kong that they would keep the income from BN (0) passports issued there. If FCO judged this feasible the Home Office wished to ensure that the cost of the passports was met directly by them. It was agreed that Hong Kong should be faced with these issues (already alluded to at paragraph 6 of FCO telegram 393 of 11 march).

(b) Family Passports

The exchange of memoranda with the Chinese would allow for a spouse as well as a child to be included in a passport though the White Paper envisaged only children. Little importance had been attached to this since the new format machine readable passport which Hong Kong were keen to adopt in common with the UK did not allow for the inclusion of spouse. The UK machine readable passport would not now be available until 1988, however, which meant that for one year at least, BN (0) passports would be the traditional hard blue cover type which did permit spouse's details to be included. If the family passport was possible it would have an obvious price attraction particularly for those obtaining the passport purely for the purpose of registration and having no intention of travel.

FCO would advise on the weight to be given to the wording in the exchange of memoranda. Hong Kong had earlier indicated that they saw no difficulty in ending the availability of family passports if this was necessary.

4