Indran Murugason v Secretary of State for the Home Department

For the purposes of the original section 2(1) of the Immigration Act 1971, qualifying words such as “in the United Kingdom or in any of the Islands” may apply to each stated method of acquiring citizenship, not merely to registration. The provision must be read linguistically and in the context of the Act as a whole. Its purpose was to restrict the right of abode to CUKCs with a direct or indirect connection to the United Kingdom through birth, adoption, naturalisation or registration there. Retention of CUKC status under a special historical arrangement did not itself confer a right of abode.

The claimant sought judicial review of the Secretary of State’s decision that he had no right of abode in the United Kingdom. His father had acquired CUKC status through birth in Penang and retained it after Malaya’s independence. The claimant was born in Penang in 1972 and acquired CUKC status by descent.

The central issue was whether the words “in the United Kingdom or in any of the Islands” in section 2(1)(b)(i) of the original Immigration Act 1971 qualified only registration, or all four routes of acquiring CUKC status.

1. The claim was dismissed. The court was required to determine for itself whether the claimant had the status of a British citizen, including whether he had a right of abode. The relevant facts were undisputed.
2. The words “in the United Kingdom or in any of the Islands” in section 2(1)(b)(i) qualified birth, adoption, naturalisation and registration. The linguistic structure of the provision pointed to that construction. The alternative construction would require wording which Parliament had not used.
3. The surrounding provisions confirmed that interpretation. Section 2(1)(d) imposed a United Kingdom birth connection for the relevant parent, while section 2(3) referred broadly to references in subsection (1), including references to birth in the United Kingdom. The provisions therefore formed part of a coherent scheme.
4. The court accepted the analysis in SSHD v Ize-Iyamu [2016] EWCA Civ 118, although the relevant observations might strictly have been obiter. The purpose of section 2, as originally enacted, was to restrict the right of abode to CUKCs with a direct or indirect connection to the United Kingdom through the acquisition of CUKC status there by birth, adoption, naturalisation or registration.
5. The decision in R v Immigration Appeal Tribunal, ex parte De Sousa [1977] Imm.A.R. 6 was consistent with treating the qualifying words as applying to all four routes. The special arrangements under which residents of Penang retained CUKC status concerned citizenship only. They did not create a special right of abode.
6. The claimant therefore had no right of abode before the British Nationality Act 1981 came into force and did not become a British citizen under section 11 of that Act. The judicial review challenge failed.

First-instance judicial review in the Administrative Court. Permission was granted on the papers on 15 July 2022. The challenge to the Secretary of State’s decision was dismissed.