Deprivation of Citizenship Orders (Effect during Appeal) Bill

Debate between Bell Ribeiro-Addy and Kit Malthouse

Committee of the whole House
Monday 14th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I am not sure that I accept the hon. Gentleman’s logic. The test of mental capacity in the judicial system applies to everyone equally. If I were being prosecuted for an offence, I would be assessed for mental capacity, just as my hon. Friend would. The court would accept that there might be mitigations for his actions, or a requirement for a different disposal if he lacks mental capacity, but that is an external influence on him. It may come about owing to mental illness or some other kind of disability—who knows?

The point is that this comes about through no reason other than birth. My citizenship, or my lack of citizenship, is conferred on me by reason of my birth—my parentage, or my heritage. I cannot do anything about it. I cannot be treated for it, as I can be for mental illness. This is purely because my parents may have come from another country, my skin may be of a different colour, or the country of the origin of my DNA may offer particular rights of citizenship. It is something arbitrary, about which I can do nothing. We might as well have a piece of legislation that says that people with red hair receive different treatment under the law, because there is nothing they can do about that.

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Clapham and Brixton Hill) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that this whole notion of heritage is not even an exact science? My first black ancestor to be born in this country was born in 1806, in Twyford; I have no idea where that is, but I know it is not that far from here. He was the son of a formerly enslaved person and a white domestic servant living in the house of his former master. I do not know what that particular ancestry is, but it goes quite far back. Just because someone called Thomas Birch-Freeman, who was living in the UK and would be deemed British by this legislation, travelled to Ghana as a missionary and settled there, and that is where my lineage comes from, I am now treated differently under the law, despite, perhaps, having heritage that may be similar to that of the right hon. Gentleman.

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady has made a very good point. My problem with this legislation is that it places a question mark over certain citizens. I am not suggesting that the legislation is on everyone’s lips every day, but when it is used with increasing frequency, it does place a question mark over people’s status as citizens of the United Kingdom, and that, I think, should be a matter of concern.

Deprivation of Citizenship Orders (Effect during Appeal) Bill

Debate between Bell Ribeiro-Addy and Kit Malthouse

2nd reading
Monday 30th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

As I am sure my right hon. Friend knows, there are various layers of appeal that can be taken, right up to the Supreme Court. The Bill says that, throughout that period, as long as the Government continue to pursue appeals, the person remains deprived of their citizenship, rather than what the Supreme Court is saying, which is that if the person wins any one of those appeals, they immediately become in effect innocent, and their citizenship is restored as if it was never removed in the first place. That is in the same way as if, were I accused of a crime and found innocent and the prosecutor decided to appeal my conviction, I would remain innocent until that appeal was heard and decided against me. If it were appealed beyond that, I would remain innocent then still.

The Government are attempting to revert to the erroneous situation as determined by the Supreme Court. In my view, they are moving the goalposts on an individual who frankly seems to have won a case fair and square in our highest court in the land.

Finally, I want to raise a more fundamental issue about this entire process. Call me an old romantic, but my view is that once you are a citizen, you are a citizen. Once you are in, you are in. Unfortunately, the development of this power over the last however many years since the 1981 Act, which brought it in, has created two classes of citizens in this country.

My hon. Friend the Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross), who spoke for the Opposition—she is no longer in her place—said, “citizenship is a privilege, not an unconditional right.” That is not true. It is an unconditional right for me as a freeborn Englishman of two English parents going back I do not know how many years. I have no claim on citizenship anywhere else. It is my absolute, undeniable, unequivocal right to have citizenship in this country, and it cannot be removed from me by any means whatsoever. That is not true of my children. I am married to a Canadian citizen, so they have a claim on Canadian citizenship. If the Home Secretary so decides, they could have their citizenship removed. That is also true of every Jewish citizen of the United Kingdom, who has a right to citizenship in Israel. There will be millions of British people of south Asian origin who feel that they have a second-class citizenship.

This law applies only to certain of our citizens. It does not apply to me. I do not know whether it applies to you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Perhaps it is making other hon. Members think about whether it applies to them.

While the Minister has been clear that we should trust him and has given us lots of undertakings, we do not make the law on the basis of a Minister we like, trust and respect; we make it on the basis that the law might fall into the hands of somebody we are not that keen on and who may be more cavalier with the powers bestowed upon them. As the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart), who spoke for the Liberal Democrats, said, we are a country that uses this power disproportionately more than any other western country. We have been free in our use of it, despite the fact that Minister after Minister has stood in the House and said, “We use it sparingly.” We do not. Dozens and dozens of people have been excluded, and we have to be honest about why. Sometimes it has been for safety, but sometimes, on balance, it has been to please the papers—because it looks good and plays well. We never ask ourselves about the cost of that to our sense of cohesion.

The hon. Member for Makerfield gave a lyrical and poetic view of citizenship, but if a large proportion of our fellow citizens believe that they have a second class of that citizenship—if some can say, “I am undeniably and unchallengeably a citizen, but you are not, so watch yourself”—what does that do to society?

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

Does the right hon. Member believe just by looking at me and my hon. Friend the Member for Brent East (Dawn Butler) next to me that the legislation could apply to people who look like us?

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady makes the point powerfully. I do not know, but she does. This legislation leaves people from minority backgrounds, second or third-generation immigrants, and those like my children who are of two parents of different nationalities, with a lingering sense of doubt about how secure they are in this nation.