A 15-year-old British girl was prevented from returning to her school in the UK for six weeks after a trip to see her grandmother in Italy because of the Home Office's new rule requiring dual British nationals to have a British passport to get back into the country.
The girl, who was stranded in Rome in April, is just the latest of a number of children and young adults hit by a new Labour government rule that came into force in February.
New Rule and Its Impact
Under the rules, dual nationals risk being denied boarding of a flight, train or ferry if they do not present a British passport, current or expired, or a “certificate of entitlement”, costing £589, attached to the passport of their second nationality.
Rowan Somerville, an author and the father of the 15-year-old, has sharply criticised the Home Office and the Foreign Office for being unable to help a British child return to school because of a new rule they created.
Other Affected Individuals
Others hit by the new Home Office rule included a young British woman trying to come home from Spain and children returning from Denmark. Many have complained of inadequate communication with the public.
In April, Somerville’s daughter was refused boarding for the flight home to the UK, where she lives. “The embassy, the Home Office and the Foreign Office bounced us from one to another,” he said.
Bureaucratic Nightmare
“They are playing with people’s lives, a child’s education. It is loathsome,” said Somerville. The Home Office could not issue the girl’s parents with a temporary passport on the grounds she did not have a British passport in the first place, said Somerville.
Her school implored government departments to intervene, writing to say they were “increasingly concerned about her prolonged absence from education”.
Somerville’s local MP Joe Powell also made representations to the Home Office and eventually the FCDO issued her with a emergency travel document.
Powell said he would be writing to the immigration minister, Mike Tapp, to ensure no other schoolchildren are left stranded by the Home Office rules, which were not communicated meaningfully to the public.
“Despite having a British parent, two valid passports, and having been at school in the UK since nursery, changes to Home Office rules resulted in her being stuck in Rome and missing six weeks of school,” he said.
“Thankfully, we were able to help and she’s now at home and back in school, but unfortunately this was not an isolated case, and it raises serious concerns about how government departments communicate policy changes once they’ve been introduced – and support those who have slipped through the net.”
Passport Application Delays
Somerville described the process as a bureaucratic nightmare, topped by another three months trying to get his daughter the British passport she now requires, something the government website says takes three weeks.
He praised the “remarkable kindness” and “willingness to help” of the frontline customer service centre at the Passport Office, but said after that he hit a wall of “stupidity”.
To illustrate the Kafkaesque nightmare dealing with the passport, he said that at one point he got a call from a senior official to tell him they could no longer talk to him as his daughter had turned 16.
“I told them I had spoken to 14 different people in their office and, instead of resolving the complaint, they were phoning me to tell me they couldn’t speak to me. It beggars belief.
“This is the kind of general circumlocution that goes on, the sheer lack of intelligent use of manpower.
“They should be focusing on real cases, which need effort.
“The frontline customer staff are very kind. But it is not their fault they are impotent.”
Home Office Response
Previously, the Home Office has dismissed as “absurd” the idea that it did not communicate the rule change, arguing it had done so on the gov.uk website.
A Home Office spokesperson said Sommerville’s daughter “was granted an emergency travel document in May, enabling them to return to the UK”, but did not offer comment on the issue of a minor being refused return to her home country and missing six weeks of school.
They added: “We also remained in contact regarding a passport application, and once the required information was received and checks were concluded, a passport was issued within eight days.”
They said that since February “all dual British citizens have needed to present either a valid British passport or certificate of entitlement when travelling to the UK. Without one, carriers cannot verify British citizenship, which may lead to delays or refused boarding.”
The FCDO has been approached for comment.
