§ 6. Colonel Wedgwoodasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies what was the object of the change enacted in the Palestine citizenship law whereby the wife of a Palestinian citizen does not acquire the nationality of her husband?
Mr. M. MacDonaldThis change was made in order to check the widespread practice of male Palestinian citizens contracting "marriages of convenience" with alien women, whom they divorce shortly after their arrival in Palestine. The practice aimed at introducing these people into Palestine in excess of the authorised immigration quotas.
§ Colonel WedgwoodMay I ask why the Palestinian Jews should not marry whom they like?
§ Mr. ButlerI would point out that in the year 1938 the proportion of divorces, shortly after marriage, to marriages contracted, was nearly 50 per cent.
§ Colonel WedgwoodSeeing that nobody can get into Palestine now, legally, why should not they be allowed to marry whom they like?
§ Miss WilkinsonIn view of the fact that all the women's organisations in this country have been pressing for years for precisely this reform, that a woman on marrying a foreign subject should not necessarily acquire the nationality of her husband, and they have always been told that it was impossible to arrange that, could it not be arranged now in regard to women who were British before their marriage?