Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made for the implications of her policies of the publication of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission and the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission entitled a Legal Analysis of Incorporating into UK Law the Birthright Commitment under the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement 1998, published March 2020.

We noted the recommendations made in the publication at the time, and Home Office officials met with its author before publication.

The Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement birthright commitment on citizenship confirms the right to hold both British and Irish citizenship is accepted by both governments. The British Nationality Act 1981 allows a person of Northern Ireland to be British and does not prevent any such person from being a dual British and Irish citizen if they so choose. It also allows someone who does not want to be a British Citizen to renounce that nationality through an administrative process.

Nationality legislation therefore already reflects the citizenship birthright commitments within the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement.