BRITISH NATIONALITY (No. 2) (Hansard, 28 April 1964)

§ Mr. John Parker (Dagenham)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for the acquisition of citizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies by certain classes of persons who would otherwise be stateless; to restrict the grounds on which persons may be deprived of such citizenship where deprivation would render them stateless; to repeal section 20(4) and section 21 of the British Nationality Act 1948; and to extend the powers exercisable under that Act with respect to British protected persons. I am asking leave to introduce a Bill which is substantially the same as that which the House gave me leave to introduce on 16th July last year. Leave was given on that occasion rather too late for the Bill to be passed into law last Sesion, but it was published. Various alterations have been made since publication as a result of suggestions made by individuals and by the Government Departments affected by it.

The primary purpose of the proposed Bill is to enable the United Kingdom to ratify the United Nations Convention for the reduction of statelessness, which was drawn up in 1961. There are two legal theories upon which the laws of nationality are based. One is that all persons born in a country have the nationality of that country. The other is that all legitimate children, born wherever they may be in the world, should have the nationality of their father. On the whole, those two ideas were incorporated in the British Nationality Act, 1948, which codified the existing law.

Certain anomalies, however, remain. I will deal, first, with the theory that all persons born in a country should have the nationality of that country. 208 There are certain exceptions in our law, mainly concerned with the children of embassy staff. These are considered as stateless even when they are the children of British mothers. On the other hand, it is a fact that under our law all illegitimate children of foreign women born in this country are given British nationality.

The second theory—that all legitimate children of British males born abroad should be counted as British—is not accepted in all countries. A number of countries have quite different laws, particularly the Scandinavian countries and Switzerland. For example, if a British girl is pregnant, but is not married, and goes to Switzerland to have the child, that child will be stateless.

The Bill would propose to clear up these various anomalies by giving, the right to apply for British nationality to all children of British mothers and fathers, legitimate or illegitimate, whether born in this country or born abroad, who would otherwise be stateless. Children born in this country not to a British mother would be able to apply for registration if otherwise they would be stateless.

One or two other points are dealt with in the proposed Bill. The first concerns foundlings who have no nationality because their parents are not known. If they are found in this country they will be given British nationality.

Another question concerns deprivation of citizenship. Under the Bill the Home Secretary would surrender his right to take away British citizenship from any citizen if, by doing so, it would make that person stateless. Finally, there is a Clause at the end which extends the powers of the Secretary of State with respect to British-protected persons in any case where these problems arise.

I thank the Home Office for its help in preparing and drafting the Bill, and particularly in getting other Government Departments to agree to its provisions. There have been many discussions on the matter, and I hope that all the problems have now been satisfactorily solved. The Bill would implement the United Nations Convention and would be a small but useful reform which would do justice to a number of 209 unfortunate persons. I have much pleasure in recommending it to the House.