§ MR. ANDERSONasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Whether there has been lately, or within a few years, any change in the fees charged for certificates of naturalisation; and, whether, what under the late Government was £1 has been changed to £5?
§ SIR WILLIAM HARCOURTWhen I came to the Home Office I found the question was under consideration as to raising these fees. I had no hesitation in deciding that they should be raised. One of the earliest cases that came under my notice was one of a very gross fraud. The hon. Member is aware that no man can be naturalized a British subject who has not resided five years in the United Kingdom, and who does not express his intention to throw in his lot with the country in which he is naturalized. The case that came before me was that of a man who I do not believe had been five days in the United Kingdom; but he got a certain number of people resident, I think, principally in Leicester Square, to swear that he had been resident a great many years in England. It turned out that being a man of large fortune, he had done this simply that he might disinherit his family by the English law, which he could not do by the laws of his own country. The relatives came to me in despair, but he was then naturalized, and the thing could not be undone; but I determined to take much greater precaution for the future, to ascertain before a man was made a British subject that he had fulfilled the conditions. These inquiries lead to a considerable amount of expense, and I raised the fee from £1 to £5. Now, I find in the Home Office we charge £79 10s. for making a man a Duke; £62 9s. for making a man an Archbishop; and £7 13s. 6d. for making a man a Knight; and I do not think £5 is too much to 1227 ask for making a man a British subject.