§ Mr. Teddy TaylorTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will take steps to accelerate the consideration of the nationality application of Mr. Makerd Rajaran Abhyankar of 8 Argyle road, London, N18, in the light of the need of his employers, Messrs. Amstrad plc of Southend, to use his engineering skills in Europe, details of which have been sent to him.
§ Mr. RentonI have not yet received the details referred to by my hon. Friend but Mr. Abhyankar's request for priority will be considered when we receive it. However, I must point out that we have over 268,000 outstanding citizenship applications in the Home Office and we are unable to give priority except in urgent compassionate circumstances, where naturalisation is necessary for an applicant's job, or where he needs to travel urgently for his career or business and cannot obtain documentation from his own authorities.