Foreign Perspectives

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For reasons which all my regular reasons will know I’ve been following the progress of British nationality legislation over the last few years.

Quick summary to bring ‘yall up to speed…. Pre-1982 children born in the UK took their nationality from their father. However, from that point children took nationality from their mother and could only take their nationality from their father if he was married to their mother. This was recognised as being discriminatory and in 2002 a new law was passed which removed that condition (ie that the father needed to be married) but that particular section wasn’t implemented until 2006.

How could they do that anyway? After all, the sex discrimination legislation forbids discrimination like that, doesn’t it? Yes, but there’s an exemption for public bodies which, of course, includes the people who handle UK nationality. However, COUNCIL DIRECTIVE 2004/113/EC of 13 December 2004 removed that exemption as of April 6th 2008 when it was implemented in UK law.

Interestingly though, the nationality people are STILL saying that children born pre-2006 can only get nationality from their father if he was married to their mother.

What’ll be interesting is their response to my recent application for James’ passport which quotes the various laws above and points out that they are breaking the law. (The EU law directs national governments to abolish any laws, regulations and administrative provisions contrary to the principle of equal treatment).

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Isn’t it strange the way that when someone you’ve not seen in several years appears on the scene, it’s as though the years between didn’t exist?

I’ve just had quite an enjoyable night chatting with an old work colleage (DG) who’s staying with us this evening. What’s perhaps even stranger is that some of the old fixtures in the workplace are still very much fixtures although sometimes it seems like if I went back there I’d be the only one left of the “old guard”!

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It’s odd to think that the baby boomers born after the second world war are now closing on retirement and generally getting old.

One sure sign of that is the shift in the mix of products that various companies have been putting out over the last few years. Mainly on the female side of things there’s been quite a jump in anti-ageing products in various skin care lines. On all sides the increasing number of incontinence products on the shelves seems a sure sign that the baby-boomer generation is getting older.

Even the people in the adverts are older now. It’s quite common to see people who are 60+ and showing it to be on the TV screen advertising products for the older generation whereas just 10 years ago that was a very rare phenomenon.

One good thing about all this is that I’m on the trailing edge of the baby boom so should be able to take advantage of the likes of health care improvements that the elder cohort will have pushed to get

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