Chaos fears for dual nationals

News at Heathrow 18/04/2009

Virgin to compete with BA in Europe : 2009 : British Airways cuts business fares

Thousands of Britons face being stranded abroad

Many thousands of Britons holding dual nationality face being stranded abroad when the Government introduces new computerised border controls.

The ‘e-borders’ system costing £1.2 billion was not designed for individuals holding 2 passports. At present dual nationals who were born outside of the UK normally use their passport of the country of birth to go home and their UK passport when entering Briton.

So as an example travellers born in the US would use their US passport to book their flights and show this when entering and leaving the US, but use their UK passport when entering Briton. Unfortunately the new ‘e-borders’ system will log passenger information supplied by the airline and detail the passport information used when boarding the flight. This will then flag up a different passport to that being shown at passport control. As a result a dual national even if admitted by border control could be registered as an alien and then limited to just 6 months in the UK.

If the same person then looked to re enter Britain they could then be recorded as having broken immigration law.

Those likely to be affected accounting for up to half a million people are those from America, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa.

Airlines are concerned since the new system was not designed for dual nationals. As things stand people will not be able to leave Britain on one passport and enter on another one.

A spokesman from UK Border Agency said “With dual passports you need to use the passport you bought your ticket with; that is the passport that is registered with Advance Passenger Information. If you don’t use the passport you will not be able to travel.”

Virgin to compete with BA in Europe : 2009 : British Airways cuts business fares

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