M&M Immigration Lawyers

Registering Your Stateless Child As British Citizen

The Paragraph 3 of Schedule 2 of the British Nationality Act 1981 provides that:

"3(1)A person born in the United Kingdom or a [F7British overseas territory] after commencement shall be entitled, on an application for his registration under this paragraph, to be so registered if the following requirements are satisfied in his case, namely—
(a)that he is and always has been stateless; and
(b)that on the date of the application he F8. . . was under the age of twenty-two; and
(c)that he was in the United Kingdom or a [F7British overseas territory](no matter which) at the beginning of the period of five years ending with that date and that (subject to paragraph 6) the number of days on which he was absent from both the United Kingdom and the [F9British overseas territories] in that period does not exceed 450."

The High Court in the landmark case of MK (A Child By Her Litigation Friend CAE), R (On the Application Of) v SSHD [2017] EWC 1365 (Admin) (14 June 2017) considered whether the definition of ‘stateless’ includes those who do not automatically acquire the nationality by operation of their own national law but to whom it is open to acquire such nationality by registration or a similar process should they chose to do so. 

Further to this, under the Indian law – The Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2003 (India) – an Indian national born aboard on or after 03 December 2004 is not a citizen unless the birth is registered at an Indian consulate ‘in such a form and manner as may be prescribed’.

In the light of the above, a stateless child can apply for registration as British Citizen if the following requirements are duly satisified:

• The relevant stateless child was born in the UK;
• The relevant child is and has always been stateless;
• The relevant child must be under the age of 22 at the date of application;
• The relevant child must be in the UK at the begining of the period of 5 years preceding the date of the application;
• The relevant child was not absent from the UK for more than 450 days in last 5 yeas preceding the date of application.