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Ordinance (something which seems to have been lost in the latest civil service row), based simply on 7 years' stay and taking Hong Kong as place of permanent residence. we are, again, intending to bring forward this liberal alignment of the Immigration Ordinance with the Basic Law provisions as soon as possible, not wait for 1997 - no-one now wishes to preserve the colonial distinctions and inappropriately ethnic references in the Immigration Ordinance; and we wish to show in advance that all foreign nationals will have remarkably good rights in Hong Kong. The Chinese side has not indicated any difficulty with this; it is just that we have to agree various details e.g. how exactly the act of taking Hong Kong as place of permanent residence is to be registered; and the Chinese wish to context this within the wider changes needed to the Immigration Ordinance before 1997; so it may take some time, perhaps even a year or two, given the present speed in the Joint Liaison Group.
Moreover right of abode in Hong Kong can mean Chinese right of abode too in 1997 - a China that is developing faster than any country in the world. The Chinese Government have made it clear that they will welcome any non-Chinese who are settled in Hong Kong to apply (and presumably get) Chinese citizenship. Thus not only Chinese people with British National (Overseas) [BN(0)] passports but also non-Chinese could have virtual dual nationality.
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This leads naturally on to what I know is the most sensitive present area for this audience the separate issue of right of abode not here but in the UK. I do not want to dwell on it; it is not anyway an issue for the Hong Kong Government to decide. Suffice to say we have supported and still support the bid of the ethnic minorities with only British passports for full British citizenship in 1997. We were very glad to see the House of Lords supporting it too. We hope that the British Government, preferably this one now or another later will give you what you ask, just as they gave 50,000 heads of households (including some of yours) in the 1990 British Nationality Scheme. But this is not because we agree anybody will be stateless in the normal sense in Hong Kong in 1997. For us, and for Hong Kong people generally, statelessness is an awkward issue. It is not really the issue : as I have explained the question is maintenance and enhancement of permanent residency rights. Legally, there are differing interpretations and views of course. But the British Government obviously feel legally secure in stating that statelessness is another right actually more specifically guaranteed de jure from the Joint Declaration than under present Hong Kong law. Indeed the British Government apparently feels it went out of its way to ensure that those who have no right of abode elsewhere than Hong Kong will automatically become British Overseas Citizens [BOC] and can continue this status for two generations, (which is as long as British citizens themselves can do if they are settled elsewhere).
I don't like
The BOC indeed seems just as good as articles in the
this live! Economic Journal recently suggested it was better in some
circumstances than the BN (0), which is the only British option for most other Hong Kong people after 1997 including some who may feel strong historical loyalty in a general way to Britain in various ways and have no particular connection with China apart from race (which is no closer than most Australians or North Americans, say, have with Britain). Chinese BN (0)s will not have British consular protection in Hong Kong. Nor, as the Home Secretary has recently made clear, do
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