Its physical possession from an individual whom the authorities wished to prevent from travelling for legitimate reasons.
16. Attached is a separate note about the procedure for issue, replacement and renewal of BN (0) passports. These matters are outside the scope of the Order, but are likely to be raised during the debates.
TRANSMISSIBILITY OF BRITISH NATIONALITY
17. There is one area of contention with EXCO which needs to be resolved before the White Paper is published. It concerns the transmissibility of British nationality to children of BN (0)s. One of the cornerstones of the nationality arrangements is that British nationality cannot be transmitted after June 1997 by virtue of a connection with Hong Kong. With the exception of the provisions to guard against statelessness (specifically agreed with the Chinese) the Order is so framed as to prevent not only the acquisition of BN (0) status after June 1997, but also the acquisition of BDTC after that date by virtue of a
connection with Hong Kong.
18. One of the members of EXCO, Sir S Y Chung, with some support from his colleagues, is strongly arguing that Hong Kong BDTCs should be able to provide for their children some transmissible form of British nationality after 1997. He has therefore proposed that the Order should incorporate an amendment to the BNA 1981 whereby the children of BN (O)s would acquire BDTC if they were born in His a Dependent Territory, or British citizenship if they were born in the UK. justification for this proposal is that the parents of the children in question were BDTCs until July 1997, and were only deprived of their power to transmit their status because of Chinese objections. He did not consider that this proposal would be inconsistent with the Chinese view of nationality, since he argued that the Chinese were unlikely to object to children of BN (0)s born after 1997 acquiring, for example, US citizenship by birth in the USA.
19.
We recommend that this proposal should be rejected for the following reasons:
a) it would be contrary to the spirit and intention of the Agreement. The Government has accepted the Chinese view that British nationality should not be acquired after 1997 by a connection with Hong Kong. What Sir S Y Chung is proposing is in effect a loophole through which
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Private notes are available after approval.