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I have no intention of giving up citizenship - this would be pointless and be of no benefit, however I do not need a British passport to enter the UK as long as I have another one. As for queuing with all the other foreign passport holders, if I'm traveling with my wife, I have to do this anyway as she is American, so it's no big deal. I actually sent  a complaint email to the embassy, but it bounced. I don't think raising with the press will get anywhere - as you have said elsewhere, the standard of consumer journalism is poor and it's probably too concerned with Big Bruv at the moment. If I ever receive a response from my MP regarding the multiple submissions I made about PITO etc, I may well contact him. What I will do is submit a FOI request to the FCO and ask why surrounding countries do not use PRS but the embassy in the US does.

You state that without a valid passport, I lose the right to live/work/whatever in the EU - are you *certain* about that? My belief is that as long as you are a citizen of one EU country, then you could live more or less anywhere in the EU. The possession of a passport does not necessarily demonstrate citizenship, although it often and usually does. I believe my UK birth certificate would demonstrate British citizenship - after all, this is the document I used to obtain a UK passport in the first place! Anyway this is all a little OT now.

I am just sick and tired of my own government using NGNs in the UK and using PRS overseas.

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You may be right, but a passport does not necessarily demonstrate status.

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I'm not sure that your assertion is correct. As a British citizen, I have the legal right to enter the UK and stay for as long as I want. Period. I really do not know what would happen if I entered on a foreign passport and overstayed my time. How can a British citizen be deported? The UK birth certificate is the document I used to establish my citizenship for the purpose of obtaining a passport in the first place. Taking citizizenship of another country does not void the British citizenship I have. Anyway it's all irrelevant to me as the situation will not arise. It's also way off-topic!

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My MP is Jonathan Shaw. He has responded to me about 0870, but that was when I lived in Kent. I have to contact him through the parliamentary web form - not ideal as it wants postcode and address details and can't cope very well with foreign addresses, but I appear to have confirmation of delivery.

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All persons undergoing naturalization to become US citizens are *required* by law under oath, to renounce their former citizenship. There is no exception to this for spouses. However, United Kingdom law does not recognize this renouncement of  British citizenship (it has to be done by another means), so a person may have dual US/UK citizenship. There is an excellent article at http://www.richw.org/dualcit/faq.html if you are interested.

Thanks for the e-mail address of the MP - I will try this out and see what happens.

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Thanks - useful information.

(OT)

You may be interested to see how accessible one public official here is - the Mayor of New York City.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/07/15/wny15.xml&sSheet...

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Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of New York, has scored a public relations coup by taking a telephone call at home at night from a woman seeking help with a housing problem. The billionaire mayor recently received a call at 10.15pm at his Upper East Side house from a Brooklyn teacher on behalf of her 94-year-old aunt, who was facing eviction.

Mr Bloomberg, 63, whose home number is listed by directory inquiries, stopped the threatened eviction. "I said, 'Mayor Bloomberg, is that you? I'm sorry I'm calling so late','' said Sheila Powsner, 55. "He just said, 'Oh, please call this number and I'll take care of it'.''

Mr Bloomberg said: "I work for the people - that's part of my job."
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MPs and Ofcom could learn something from the last line above.

Actually you will find that Parliament is in London and many have constituencies in Wales, Yorkshire and Scotland.  They don't spend all summer on holiday but take just 2 or 3 weeks on holiday and then attend lots of events etc in their constituencies.  If Parliament wasn't in recess for about 16 weeks a year I imagine there would be a lot more divorces and a lot more unhappy constituents who never saw their MPs.

MPs have secretaries and if a secretary is on holiday another temporary secretary or a research assistant takes over to provide cover.  They don't ignore your correspondence just because it is the summer.

I would suggest that a much cushier job than being an MP is being an overpaid and publicly unaccountable director of Ofcom.

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Dorf,

I think the intensity of my debate on this issue with idb may have in fact left you confused.

I never suggested that not having a passport or not renewing one deprived you of the right to British nationality or residence (a large percentage of the uk population still do not have a passport).  I only said you would lose your right of permanent abode in the other EU countries without a valid uk passport.  I also said that if idb didn't renew his British passport and then re-entered the country on his American passport that he would probably be committing an offence for which he might be fined but clealry he couldn't be deported since one does not require a passport to reside in the UK.  One does require it to reside in the rest of the EU though.

As for the complexities of obtaining US citizenship while retaining British citizenship that is all laid out in the little article to which idb provided the link:-

http://www.richw.org/dualcit/faq.html

I knew an American lady married to a British citizen about 15 years ago who did not take British citizenship because the Americans would then have made her give up her US passport.  But clearly things have moved on since then and the Americans now seem to take the view that once you have obtained US citizenship it is  now quite hard to lose it, even if you were not born in the country.

I hope that clarifies the position.

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Much of what you say is correct - nationality is not dependent on having a passport. Most Americans, for example, do not have passports. British nationality is usually either obtained through birth, through a relative's birth, through naturalization, or possibly by some other means such as colonial legacy.

The UK is perfectly happy with dual citizenship, as is the US. On naturalization in the US, one is required to renounce any other citizenship, however the UK does not recognize such renouncement as valid.

You are correct about the taxation system here - the IRS requirements for filing tax returns on both citizens and residents are far stricter than in the UK and does, as you state, include income from anywhere. The actual detail is, however, complex!

This article probably helps to explain why the FCO is so incompetent:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4745467.stm

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Foreign Office management d4mned

The Foreign Office is over-staffed, inefficient and resistant to change, according to a report ordered by the department itself. The damning consultants' report says one in 13 staff at the Foreign Office could be axed.

It says: "The entire organisation needs to be challenged and reformed but the leadership lacks the skills needed and the will to upset the status quo."

The Foreign Office says it has already acted on the report's recommendations.

The report was brought into public view by Labour MP Andrew Mackinlay, who had it placed in the House of Commons library.

"It is a devastating report, showing systematic poor management, lack of accountability and bureaucracy by the Sir Humphreys and Terry Thomas-type characters who still occupy the top echelons of the Foreign Office," said the MP. [...]

It goes on: "Employees are seen as generalists so that a lack of professional competence or experience in (say) finance or human resources (or even in specific political or diplomatic skills) is accepted even where it acts as a significant drag on the effectiveness of a department."

[...]
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