MB, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department

Section 4B of the British Nationality Act 1981 creates a conditional entitlement to registration as a British citizen. The Secretary of State must be satisfied that the applicant has no other citizenship or nationality and has not lost citizenship or nationality through action or inaction since 4 July 2002. Retention of Indian nationality, or loss of it through the applicant’s own application for British overseas citizenship, defeats the statutory conditions. Previous grants in other cases do not prevent the Secretary of State applying the statute. An applicant cannot avoid the statutory result by failing to investigate the foreign-law consequences of the application. Authority concerning stateless refugees was confined to that context.

The applicant, born in India and an Indian citizen by birth, held British overseas citizen status. After obtaining an Indian passport and later a British overseas passport, he applied to register as a British citizen under section 4B of the British Nationality Act 1981.

The Secretary of State was not satisfied that the statutory conditions were met. Irwin J rejected the applicant’s judicial review claim. The applicant sought permission to appeal, arguing that other applicants had been granted citizenship, that the Secretary of State could not require confirmation of his Indian nationality because this might leave him stateless, and that his status had consequences in European Union law. The central issue was whether any of those grounds disclosed a reasonable prospect of successfully challenging the refusal.

1. Outcome. Lord Justice Longmore refused permission to appeal. The application was hopeless and there was no reasonable prospect of the Court of Appeal reversing Irwin J’s decision.
2. Statutory conditions. Section 4B of the British Nationality Act 1981 requires the Secretary of State to be satisfied both that a British overseas citizen has no citizenship or nationality other than that of a British overseas citizen and that, since 4 July 2002, the person has not lost any citizenship or nationality through action or inaction.
3. Application of the conditions. The Secretary of State was entitled to apply the statute according to its terms. Grants of citizenship in other cases, without details of those cases being before the court, did not establish that the present decision was unlawful. The applicant faced two alternatives: if he retained Indian nationality, he failed the no-other-nationality condition under subsection 2(b); if he had lost that nationality, the loss resulted from his own action in applying for British overseas citizenship. The potentially unfortunate consequence did not alter the statutory result.
4. Foreign-law consequences. The applicant could not hold the Secretary of State accountable for failing to investigate or explain the consequences of an application under the nationality law of another country. The applicant had in any event been advised to consult the Indian authorities.
5. European Union argument. The reasoning in MH, [2008] EWHC 2525, concerned stateless refugees with United Kingdom travel documents. It did not apply to this applicant, who was not a stateless refugee, and did not displace the statutory requirements.
6. Order. Application refused.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division): On 16 September 2009, Lord Justice Longmore refused permission to appeal.
2. High Court of Justice, Queen’s Bench Division, Administrative Court: Irwin J rejected the application for judicial review of the Secretary of State’s refusal to register the applicant as a British citizen.