The question of who counts as a citizen has become unavoidable in Britain. The official dogma is that we are a happy land of diversity, all bound together by the BBC and “shared values.” Privately, however, even in the semi-Stasi environment of speech codes and denunciations, people say something else. I have heard men and women, not cranks or extremists but ordinary members of the public, mutter over drinks that ethnic cleansing may soon be necessary to keep the British from being dispossessed in their own country.

This is the sort of talk you hear when people believe the official channels of government and debate have been closed to them. It is dangerous. It is also unnecessary. I sympathise with the concerns but not with the suggested remedy. A single and irregular solution would not only be politically disastrous and morally regrettable, but also impossible. You cannot drive millions from the country without a degree of repression that even our busybody rulers could not organise. And if they tried, it would end in blood and collapse.

The sensible way forward is constitutional and peaceful. It is to tighten the law of citizenship. It is to define, carefully but firmly, who belongs and who does not. Once that is settled, once the citizen body is stabilised, then other questions of migration and assimilation can be addressed at leisure.

That is what the draft Bill set out here attempts.

I have suggested the census of 1881 as the cut-off. The date has a pleasing neatness. It is late enough that most families can prove their descent. It is early enough to predate the mass inward movements of the twentieth century. Could we go earlier? Yes, but it would be administratively messy. Few people can document their family histories back before 1841 without professional genealogists. Could we go later? Again yes. Perhaps 1911 would be more convenient. Family memories and papers generally stretch back to the Great War, but rarely further. I do not insist on 1881. I put it forward as a serviceable date that would keep the paperwork manageable and would do the job of anchoring citizenship in the historic nation.

I have suggested two direct ancestors as the test. Some will say this is too lenient. Why not four? Why not eight? The answer is administrative reality. To demand four or more would create chaos. You would swamp the Home Office in paper. You would hold up the process for decades. Two is enough to prove a real connection without making the law unworkable.

An objection will be that, by asking for only two ancestors, you allow many persons of mixed heritage to remain citizens. Yes, of course you do. That is inevitable. For nearly a century, Britain has seen mixed unions. You cannot now undo them without absurdities that would shame a nineteenth-century American state legislature. To try to base citizenship on blood quantum or skin tone would be grotesque. It would also be impossible to administer.

This Bill is not an exercise in fantasy ethnography. It is a practical instrument of statecraft. Citizenship must rest on documentation, not on phenotype. It would also be cheap to enforce. I do not expect that everyone will be required to prove ancestry before being accepted as a citizen. In practice, everyone who asserts citizenship can be presumed to be telling the truth, unless challenged. We can expect that no one will be challenged to prove anything until he applies for a driving licence or passport, or to be registered to vote, or to receive any state welfare benefit. The relevant officials – suitably purged officials, I might add – will then be at liberty to ask for evidence of descent based on an inspection of names or photographic appearance.

Of course, some challenges will be irksome. Winston Ogoke, for example, might have a grandmother from the traditional population, and be able to show the required ancestry. Challenging him to make the necessary enquiries might be annoying for him. This is unfortunate. But it will be less of an administrative problem than making the same demand on the whole population, and the necessary enquiries are not that much trouble to make to full satisfaction.

On the other hand, a lack of challenges will allow many people who are really ineligible to slip through. For example, John Smith might be the child on both sides of Polish immigrants who changed their names in 1980 when they arrived. Because he looks and sounds traditionally British, no one might challenge him. Would this be a problem? I do not think so.

But the drastic penalties will deter false assertions. For example, Mr Someone may decide to make a false claim of citizenship. This will be challenged on the obvious grounds that he does not seem to be traditionally British. When he cannot show the required ancestry, he will be stripped of all assets and deported to his ancestral homeland as a pauper. I find it hard to believe that anyone with an ounce of sense would dare take that risk.

What of those already holding British citizenship under the existing law? Should they all be deported? That is a question for later settlement. The Bill itself provides that they may remain in the country—so long as they behave themselves and do not live at the expense of the taxpayer. Their status is personal, not hereditary. It cannot be transmitted to children or to spouses. They may live here, but they do not belong to the nation in the full sense. To give them a legal standing short of citizenship, the Bill declares them to be British Protected Persons (BPPs). This is not a new category. It exists already in international law and in the British Nationality Act 1981. BPPs may have passports. They may receive diplomatic protection abroad. But they may not vote, hold office, or transmit their status. They are, to be blunt, tolerated residents, not citizens. Messrs Mercadente and Wang would call them metics, or μέτοικοι.

It will be said that such measures are unprecedented. This is nonsense. Most serious countries define their citizen bodies with at least as much care.

• France is still shaped by the Napoleonic Code and subsequent nationality laws. For all the rhetoric of jus soli, France has never accepted automatic, unqualified birthright citizenship. Descent has always mattered. The French language, the French school system, and formal assimilation have mattered too.
• Germany traditionally defined citizenship by jus sanguinis. Until the year 2000, a child born in Germany to foreign parents was not a German citizen. Even now, the rules are strict: descent from a German remains the principal criterion, and the right to pass on citizenship lapses if the family lives abroad for too long.
• Israel is stricter still. The Law of Return gives automatic citizenship to any Jew, defined by descent or recognised conversion. Others may live in Israel, even permanently, but they are not citizens. Nobody claims this is illiberal. Everyone accepts it as natural.

If France, Germany, and Israel can define their citizen bodies, why not Britain? Indeed, the scandal is that Britain has not done so, preferring instead to leave the matter to politicians led by malevolent ideologies, or simply bribed, to care nothing for our historic nation.

Let me add one final clarification. This draft is presented as a contribution to debate. It is one possible solution to an increasingly urgent problem. In making this contribution, I assert my rights under the Bill of Rights 1689:

That it is the right of the subjects to petition the King, and all commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning are illegal. [1]

If the authorities imagine they can prosecute me, or the Libertarian Alliance, for publishing this draft, they will put us in the same position as the Seven Bishops, who in 1688 were dragged into court for petitioning against James II’s Declaration of Indulgence. Their acquittal, cheered by the crowds, was the spark of the Glorious Revolution. Our prosecution would not have the same effect, but would be an unnecessary embarrassment to an already embarrassed police state.

Some will object that the courts would strike this Bill down as inconsistent with the Human Rights Act 1998 or with “international obligations.” That is why the draft expressly declares itself a constitutional statute. It overrides the HRA. It excludes judicial review. It excludes the jurisdiction of Strasbourg and Luxembourg. This is the necessary response to Laws LJ’s judgment in the Metric Martyrs case (Thoburn v Sunderland City Council [2002] EWHC 195 (Admin)). In that case, the courts invented a hierarchy of statutes, placing the HRA among “constitutional” laws that could not be repealed by implication. Very well: if the courts insist on constitutional statutes, let us give them one—but let us make it clear that this one overrides theirs.

The traditional population of this country faces dispossession through the ballot box. I do not share the growing view that this must be prevented by violence or irregular expulsion. That would not work, and it would disgrace us. The rational course is to stabilise the electorate by tightening citizenship law. Once we know who belongs to the nation, as I have said, other matters can be discussed at leisure. The draft Bill is one possible way of doing this. It is not perfect. It can be improved. But it begins a discussion that can no longer be avoided.

And if the authorities dislike even the discussion, that is their problem, not ours.

Notes

[1] Bill of Rights (1689), 1 Will. & Mar. Sess. 2 c. 2, Article 5.
[2] R v Thoburn and Others [2002] EWHC 195 (Admin), commonly known as the Metric Martyrs case.
[3] Trial of the Seven Bishops (1688), formally R v Sancroft and Others, State Trials, vol. 12.

 

---

A BILL to Define the qualifications for British citizenship, to regulate eligibility for offices under the Crown and for elected office, to make transitional provision for persons previously deemed British citizens, and to declare the supremacy of this Act.

Be it enacted by the King’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—

1. Status of this Act

(1) This Act is a constitutional statute.
(2) Accordingly—
(a) it shall not be subject to repeal or modification by implication;
(b) it shall have effect notwithstanding any provision of the Human Rights Act 1998, the European Communities Act 1972, the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, or any enactment or rule of law to the contrary;
(c) no court or tribunal shall question the validity of any provision of this Act.

2. British Citizenship

(1) A person shall be deemed a British citizen if, and only if, he or she can demonstrate descent from not fewer than two direct ancestors resident within the present territory of the United Kingdom at the time of the census taken in the year 1881, or at the time of any census conducted prior thereto.
(2) For the purposes of this section, “direct ancestor” shall mean parent, grandparent, or any further lineal forebear.

3. Restriction on Holding Office

(1) Only persons recognised as British citizens under section 2 of this Act shall be eligible—
(a) to hold any office of profit under the Crown; or
(b) to stand for, or to hold, any elected office within the United Kingdom.

4. Exclusion of Dual Nationals

(1) No person who holds the citizenship of any other country shall be eligible to hold British citizenship.

5. False Claims to Citizenship

(1) Any person who knowingly makes a false claim to British citizenship shall, on conviction—
(a) be adjudged bankrupt in accordance with the existing laws of bankruptcy, the Crown to stand as sole creditor; and
(b) if a citizen of any other country, be deported to that country.

6. Exceptional Grants of Citizenship

(1) The Secretary of State may, in exceptional cases, grant British citizenship to a person who is otherwise unable to prove the descent required by section 2, where—
(a) both parents are of unknown origin, or are foundlings, or where descent records are lacking through no fault of the applicant;
(b) the applicant is of good character; and
(c) the Secretary of State is reasonably satisfied that the applicant is likely to have had two direct lineal ancestors resident in the United Kingdom at the time of the 1881 census, or any prior census.
(2) Citizenship granted under this section shall confer all rights and obligations of British citizenship under this Act.

7. Transitional Provision for Existing Citizens

(1) Any person who, immediately before the commencement of this Act, was recognised as a British citizen under any enactment then in force, but who is not eligible for British citizenship under section 2 of this Act, shall—
(a) be permitted to remain in the United Kingdom on condition of good behaviour and of non-dependence upon public funds;
(b) not be entitled to hold any office of profit under the Crown or to stand for, or to hold, any elected office;
(c) not be entitled to transmit this status by marriage, descent, or birth.

7A. Status of British Protected Persons

(1) Persons described in section 7 shall be deemed British Protected Persons for the purposes of the British Nationality Act 1981 and of international law.
(2) As British Protected Persons, they shall—
(a) be entitled to remain within the United Kingdom, subject to the conditions in section 7(1);
(b) be entitled to such travel documents as the Secretary of State may issue;
(c) be entitled to diplomatic protection of the Crown when abroad.
(3) They shall not—
(a) be entitled to vote in any election or referendum;
(b) be entitled to hold any office of profit under the Crown or any elected office;
(c) be entitled to transmit their status by marriage, descent, or birth.
(4) Nothing in this section shall confer upon a British Protected Person the right of abode in the United Kingdom beyond the permission to remain granted by section 7(1).

8. Exclusion of Judicial Review

(1) No court or tribunal shall have jurisdiction to review, annul, suspend, question, or disregard any provision of this Act.
(2) The validity of any act or decision taken under this Act shall not be subject to review by reason of any alleged incompatibility with human rights law, international law, or customary law.
(3) For the avoidance of doubt, this section is to be read consistently with Article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1689, which declares that proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court.

9. Reaffirmation of Parliamentary Sovereignty

(1) It is hereby declared that Parliament remains sovereign, and that the provisions of this Act are to be given full force and effect according to their terms.
(2) No court shall interpret this Act in a manner inconsistent with the expressed intention of Parliament as set out herein.

10. Exclusion of International Jurisdiction

(1) No court or tribunal in the United Kingdom shall have regard to, or give effect to, any decision, judgment, or advisory opinion of any international court, tribunal, or body in construing or applying this Act.
(2) Without prejudice to the generality of subsection (1), this includes—
(a) the European Court of Human Rights;
(b) the Court of Justice of the European Union;
(c) the International Court of Justice;
(d) any body of the United Nations, or any treaty-monitoring committee thereof.
(3) No provision of any treaty, convention, or instrument of international law, whether ratified or unratified, shall have effect so as to limit or qualify the operation of this Act.

11. Non-Derogation Clause

(1) This Act shall not be repealed, amended, or modified except by an Act of Parliament which expressly states that it repeals, amends, or modifies the British Citizenship and Public Office Act 2025.
(2) No repeal, amendment, or modification shall be implied from the enactment of any later statute.

12. Interpretation

In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires—
“Office of profit under the Crown” has the meaning recognised by law at the commencement of this Act.
“Elected office” means any position filled by popular vote under the laws of the United Kingdom.

13. Short Title and Commencement

(1) This Act may be cited as the British Citizenship and Public Office Act 2025.
(2) This Act shall come into force on such day as His Majesty may by Order in Council appoint.

 

---

British Citizenship and Public Office Bill 2025
Explanatory Notes

These notes refer to the British Citizenship and Public Office Bill 2025 as introduced. They are intended to explain its provisions in plain terms.

Overview

The Bill redefines British citizenship on ancestral grounds, limits eligibility for public office to those recognised as citizens under the new definition, and makes transitional provision for persons who previously held British citizenship but cannot satisfy the new criteria. It also declares itself a constitutional statute, excludes judicial review, and prohibits foreign courts or international bodies from interfering with its operation.

The central purpose is to stabilise the body of citizens, thereby preventing the traditional population from being outvoted or displaced, while leaving questions of migration and settlement to be addressed subsequently.

Clause-by-Clause Commentary

Clause 1: Status of this Act

• Declares the Act to be a constitutional statute.
• Prevents repeal or amendment by implication.
• Ensures the Act prevails over the Human Rights Act 1998, EU-derived law, or any contrary enactment.
• Ousts jurisdiction of domestic courts to question its validity.

Purpose: To immunise the Act against judicial trimming or reinterpretation, in light of Thoburn v Sunderland City Council (“Metric Martyrs”) [2002].

Clause 2: British Citizenship

• Defines British citizenship as requiring descent from at least two direct ancestors resident in the UK at the time of the 1881 census or any prior census.
• “Direct ancestor” includes parent, grandparent, or any earlier lineal forebear.

Purpose: Establishes an objective and administrable ancestry test, anchoring citizenship in the historic population without recourse to racial appearance or genetic criteria.

Clause 3: Restriction on Holding Office

• Limits public office, both under the Crown and by election, to citizens as defined by Clause 2.

Purpose: Prevents non-citizens from holding positions of political or administrative influence.

Clause 4: Exclusion of Dual Nationals

• Prohibits persons holding another citizenship from being British citizens.

Purpose: Ensures undivided loyalty to the United Kingdom.

Clause 5: False Claims to Citizenship

• Provides that anyone knowingly making a false claim to British citizenship shall, on conviction, be declared bankrupt with the Crown as sole creditor.
• If also a citizen of another country, that person shall be deported to that country.

Purpose: Creates a clear criminal and civil penalty for fraudulent claims, combining personal ruin with removal from the jurisdiction.

Clause 6: Exceptional Grants of Citizenship

• Allows the Home Secretary to grant citizenship in cases where descent cannot be proved (e.g. foundlings).
• Requires good character and reasonable likelihood of ancestral connection.

Purpose: Provides a humane escape valve in hard cases, while maintaining strict standards.

Clause 7: Transitional Provision for Existing Citizens

• Persons who currently hold British citizenship but cannot meet the new ancestry test may remain in the UK if law-abiding and not dependent on public funds.
• Such persons may not transmit status by marriage or descent.

Purpose: Avoids mass deportations, while ensuring the traditional nation remains politically dominant.

Clause 7A: British Protected Persons

• Declares those transitional residents to be British Protected Persons (BPPs) under the British Nationality Act 1981.
• Grants limited rights: residence, passports, diplomatic protection.
• Denies political rights: no vote, no office, no hereditary transmission.

Purpose: Prevents statelessness while marking the distinction between citizens and tolerated residents.

Clause 8: Exclusion of Judicial Review

• Bars domestic courts from reviewing, questioning, or annulling the Act.
• Reaffirms Article 9 of the Bill of Rights 1689 (“proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court”).

Purpose: Anticipates and blocks judicial activism.

Clause 9: Reaffirmation of Parliamentary Sovereignty

• Declares explicitly that Parliament remains sovereign.
• Requires courts to apply the Act according to its terms, not to reinterpret it.

Purpose: Reasserts the traditional constitutional doctrine against erosion by judicial invention.

Clause 10: Exclusion of International Jurisdiction

• Prohibits UK courts from having regard to judgments of Strasbourg, Luxembourg, The Hague, or UN treaty committees.
• Disapplies treaty obligations insofar as they would limit this Act.

Purpose: Blocks backdoor subordination of Parliament to foreign or international bodies.

Clause 11: Non-Derogation Clause

• Provides that the Act can only be repealed, amended, or modified by a future Act of Parliament expressly naming it.
• Excludes repeal by implication.

Purpose: Fortifies the Act’s permanence and raises political costs of repeal.

Clause 12: Interpretation

• Defines terms such as “office of profit under the Crown” and “elected office.”

Clause 13: Short Title and Commencement

• Gives the Act its formal title.
• Provides for commencement by Order in Council.

General Justification

The draft Act provides a peaceful and constitutional alternative to proposals for ethnic cleansing or other irregular remedies. It tightens citizenship to stabilise the body politic, without mass expulsions or racial tests. It uses the precedent of France, Germany, and Israel, all of which define citizenship in terms of descent and loyalty rather than mere residence.

The Act is drafted to withstand judicial attack by declaring itself constitutional, excluding judicial review, and reaffirming the sovereignty of Parliament. It explicitly invokes the Bill of Rights 1689 to place the debate within the tradition of English liberties.

The publication of this draft is protected by the right of petition affirmed in the Bill of Rights. To prosecute its authors would place the Government in the position of James II when he prosecuted the Seven Bishops in 1688 [3].

Notes

[1] Bill of Rights (1689), 1 Will. & Mar. Sess. 2 c. 2, Article 5.
[2] R v Thoburn and Others [2002] EWHC 195 (Admin), “Metric Martyrs.”
[3] Trial of the Seven Bishops (1688), R v Sancroft and Others, State Trials, vol. 12.
[4] French Nationality Code (Code civil, Livre Ier, Titre Ier, Chapitre II).
[5] German Nationality Act (Staatsangehörigkeitsgesetz), especially amendments of 2000.
[6] Israel, Law of Return (1950), amended 1970.