Dual citizens/ETA enforcement from 24 February 2026

lustyd said:
You’d be going through border control. Your entire premise was missing border control. You’re not smarter than them, I promise you that.
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No, it wanst. It was mising UK border control which it does. It is on;y a problem if Irish and UK border control share information.
 
SimonX said:
No, it wanst. It was mising UK border control which it does. It is on;y a problem if Irish and UK border control share information.
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You don’t understand the system at all. The common travel area means it’s treated as one border. You may as well leave from London.
 
lustyd said:
Plenty of reasons. Society would be better off if people were fully committed to a home country. Look at our politicians who have the option to run away (and royals, for that matter) and how they behave. Having multiple passports is a way around the rules for many people, and that is fundamentally unfair, especially since it's mostly the wealthy who end up with multiple passports and citizenship. The tight rules on visas such as Schengen would likely be fixed quickly if everyone had to choose just one passport and stick with it, handing it in before getting a different one.

I honestly can't think of many reasons in favour, from the perspective of a cohesive society. Plenty of selfish reasons, obviously, but that's part of the problem.
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I was born here to NZ parents in the 60s and was given a British passport for dropping on British soil.
I left here aged three months and got a Kiwi passport based on seven generations of antecedents.
I came back here at 32 and have lived here, paid taxes and earned my keep since then. I'm not particularly wealthy, a politician nor a member of a royal family.
I may well retire back to NZ, leaving NZ with the cost of my upbringing and education, and with my end of life costs. The UK, meanwhile, got my prime earning years and the taxes that came from it.
So, dual passports are not all bad, are they.
 
newtothis said:
I was born here to NZ parents in the 60s and was given a British passport for dropping on British soil.
I left here aged three months and got a Kiwi passport based on seven generations of antecedents.
I came back here at 32 and have lived here, paid taxes and earned my keep since then. I'm not particularly wealthy, a politician nor a member of a royal family.
I may well retire back to NZ, leaving NZ with the cost of my upbringing and education, and with my end of life costs. The UK, meanwhile, got my prime earning years and the taxes that came from it.
So, dual passports are not all bad, are they.
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And why is it you think that should be different to someone not born into it? Surely if theres a benefit everyone should be free to move then move back if they contribute. Living and contributing in each country when they wish to be a part of that country.
 
lustyd said:
Connections isn’t the same as choosing a home. I did specify non-selfish reasons (not picking a fight there I couldn’t think of another way to word it). There’s no benefit for the UK that I could see.

I quite like the US system, you want to be a citizen then you pay full tax on everything to keep it. Where they fail is they also have an exit fee which is madness.

I’ll admit I could see HK and Ireland as edge cases for a given period following separations. Perhaps 5 years to choose a permanent home nation would be reasonable.
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My point is that anyone who gains British citizenship EXCEPT by birth almost inevitably has dual citizenship, unless they go to great lengths to renounce other citizenships.

I note with regard to one of your other points that enabling US citizens who are not domiciled in the USA to renounce their US citizenship is a growth industry, entirely because the US taxes it's citizens wherever they live and regardless of whether they pay tax elsewhere.

The vast majority of people with dual citizenship have gained it in this incidental manner, and gain small benefit from it. It's a total non-issue.
 
AntarcticPilot said:
It's a total non-issue.
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Surely by that logic it would be a non issue either way. If there isn’t a benefit to having dual citizenship then there’s no loss to require renouncing it either.
I don’t think it’s asking a lot to do some admin to join the nation.
 
lustyd said:
Surely by that logic it would be a non issue either way. If there isn’t a benefit to having dual citizenship then there’s no loss to require renouncing it either.
I don’t think it’s asking a lot to do some admin to join the nation.
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The point is that most nations make renouncing citizenship arduous and difficult, requiring attendance at specific offices in the country concerned. Certainly Hong Kong does, as I know from our own enquiries; you can only renounce it's citizenship by making a formal declaration in a specific office in Hong Kong. And given it's cosmopolitan nature, Hong Kong is probably easier than most. I know that renouncing US citizenship is extremely complex and difficult; as I mentioned there is something of a growth industry to facilitate such renunciation precisely because the USA follows a policy that derives from exactly your suggestion; all US citizens must pay US taxes regardless of domicile. Most other nations have reciprocal tax arrangements; for example if I were to pay Hong Kong taxes (which are less than UK taxes) I would still be liable to pay the difference to HMRC, unless I was permanently domiciled in HK. But I would only be liable for the difference, not full UK taxes. I don't know the exact regulations as the situation is possible but unlikely for me, but I did enquire into it as I derive some income from Hong Kong.
 
lustyd said:
And why is it you think that should be different to someone not born into it? Surely if theres a benefit everyone should be free to move then move back if they contribute. Living and contributing in each country when they wish to be a part of that country.
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I don't. But you were the one that said:
"Personally I’d like to see dual citizenship abolished for various reasons."
I was just demonstrating a reason this is not a great idea.
 
SimonX said:
My wife and I both have dual passports and we enter and leave the U.K. on U.K. passports and enter and leave the EU on EU passports.
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I can see how that creates a potential data sharing problem for the various agencies? MrSXUK checks out of the uk but MrSXEU arrives at the destination. For pre-travel reporting are you telling the Uk you are leaving or the EU you are arriving. Equally of course if you try to checkout the UK on your EU passport and they don’t have you recorded as arriving that could create some confusion/concern.

So in that sense I can see some argument for LustyD’s “pick your country” argument. However I don’t think it really solves the problem he thinks it does - the very rich will still be able to “buy” a passport and the ancestral connections will still let you switch if it is more appealing, whilst those without such tenuous links will not. Then theres marital situations where a couple between them could effectively have rights to be in two countries (but perhaps might cause issues if one wants to separate) etc. At what age would a child have to decide their nationality? How would you resolve that for say an Irish and British couple living in France who have a child in France? What happens if they decide to move back to UK does the child have to forfeit the nationality of their country of birth? Now, I do think there is merit in having one clear “country of residence” for tax, voting, etc.
 
Zing said:
It’s a great idea if you think individual freedom is secondary to the power of the state to control.
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People seem to forget that closing down borders cuts both ways, it makes it more difficult for "citizens" to escape too - mainly due to reciprocal restrictions from the rest of the world, as between the UK and EU countries. Now UK citizens need permission in the form of applications to travel, enough money, and healthcare coverage to go somewhere where previously they only needed a means of transport.

.... and as an aside, there is a downside to multiple citizenships. If you are in a third country, and you get into trouble, then the countries where you have citizenship can point at each other and claim that you are not their problem.
 
Seems there's a lot of fuss about nothing in many of the comments. We have properties in UK and EU and bank accounts in both, no problems with money transfers. I am UK citizen with residence in Portugal, my wife has dual citizenship, enters and leaves UK on UK passport (married name), enters and leaves Portugal on Portuguese one, under maiden name. Only problem I see is when ETIAS starts, we may have to book flights out of UK under her Portuguese name to avoid problems with airline check in as she won't have a visa waiver tied to married name/UK passport..
 
ylop said:
I can see how that creates a potential data sharing problem for the various agencies? MrSXUK checks out of the uk but MrSXEU arrives at the destination. For pre-travel reporting are you telling the Uk you are leaving or the EU you are arriving. Equally of course if you try to checkout the UK on your EU passport and they don’t have you recorded as arriving that could create some confusion/concern.
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Never been a problem. Did it twice in the past few months, first on a trip to Amsterdam by plane and later by Eurostar to Paris
 
SimonX said:
Why would it be?
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I'll refer you back to post 51. At some point its likely that information sharing between nations will reach a point where the person who left and the person who arrived do not appear to match, or where the advance notification details don't match. That's likely to rouse some sort of "suspicion" - now it MIGHT be a common enough occurrence that it resolves itself without your involvement but it really wouldn't surprise me if you eventually find this slows down your arrival/departure. It must be really dull staring at passports all day - having one that's triggers a flag would almost count as exciting.
 
ylop said:
I'll refer you back to post 51. At some point its likely that information sharing between nations will reach a point where the person who left and the person who arrived do not appear to match, or where the advance notification details don't match. That's likely to rouse some sort of "suspicion" - now it MIGHT be a common enough occurrence that it resolves itself without your involvement but it really wouldn't surprise me if you eventually find this slows down your arrival/departure. It must be really dull staring at passports all day - having one that's triggers a flag would almost count as exciting.
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Its relatively common. I always have both passports on my hand just in case. I did have one last year when the guy at Heathrow was surprised I hadn't been stamped in/out of France but explained in 30 seconds.
 
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