LONDON (Middle East Eye) -- The UK government has suffered a parliamentary setback over proposed legislation that would give it powers to secretly strip people of their citizenship.
Members of the House of Lords, the UK parliament’s upper chamber, voted on Monday against the extension of already far-reaching powers, as they continue to consider amendments to the government’s controversial Nationality and Borders Bill.
However, the House of Lords will not have the final say on the bill. MPs in the House of Commons, where the government has a large majority, could yet reject the Lords’ proposed changes.
Nor does the removal of the amendment have any effect on existing citizenship-stripping powers, which have been extensively used in recent years against British nationals who travelled to Syria.
The UK has been described by researchers as a “global leader in using citizenship deprivation as a counterterrorism measure”.
Historic citizenship-stripping powers targeted at naturalized citizens on disloyalty grounds had largely fallen into disuse prior to 2002, when the government introduced new measures in an attempt to revoke the citizenship of Abu Hamza, an Egyptian-born cleric subsequently convicted of terrorism in the U.S.
The 2002 legislation allowed for British-born nationals as well as naturalized citizens to lose their nationality rights. Successive governments gradually broadened the scope of the powers so that home secretaries can now deprive anyone of citizenship if they are satisfied that doing so is “conducive to the public good” and would not leave an individual stateless.
No criminal conviction is required. Letters often state that individuals have been assessed as presenting “a risk to the national security of the United Kingdom”.
The government’s use of the powers surged to unprecedented levels in response to the perceived threat posed by British nationals returning from Syria.
Between 2010 and 2015, 33 people were stripped of their citizenship, according to Home Office figures. In 2016, 14 people were deprived, and in 2017 the number jumped to 104. In 2018, the most recent year for which figures have been released, the number was 21.
Some subjects of citizenship-stripping orders argue that they have been left effectively stateless, because the government bases its assessment that they are dual nationals on a right of citizenship to a parent’s country of birth, even if they have never taken up that citizenship or even visited the country.
Human rights organizations and lawyers have compared the powers to “medieval exile and banishment”.