BURST
Mike Stephen was born in Salford, England, but has lived in Canada since 1967.
The 84-year-old visits the U.K. every year, and holds both Canadian and British passports. But he worried a trip to Britain he has booked for May may be in peril, because of new British passport regulations.
As of Feb. 25, anyone born in Britain will no longer be able to enter Britain with just a Canadian passport. They will have to have a British or Irish passport to get into the U.K., or a “certificate of entitlement” proving you have a “right of abode” in Britain.
The change was announced last year, but wasn’t well-publicized until recently, when some British-Canadians found out they had to scramble to get a British passport.
Stephen’s British passport was scheduled to run out, so he applied for a new one. But he has been stymied by new procedures.
“About two months ago, I sent off to get a new passport,” he said. “They came back and said, ‘We can’t renew it without a colour copy of every page of your Canadian passport.’”
Stephen thought that was unreasonable, given that there are 38 pages in a Canadian passport and only a couple have information on them.
So his response was “stick your passport, I’ll just do the Canadian.” But the British passport office informed him that the rules had changed, and he couldn’t, he had to get a British one.
He sent off the required colour copies, but they were rejected because “the quality of the photocopy of your picture isn’t good enough.”
He made new copies and has sent them off.
“We’re in limbo at the moment,” said Stephen, who has already booked flights and accommodation in Britain.
Derek Crawford was born in Southampton, England but has lived in Canada since the 1970s. He was supposed to fly to London for a few days en route to Europe, but didn’t hear about the new regulations until last week.
You have to send an application for a British passport to the U.K., and it might take several weeks to get your passport back. Fearing he wouldn’t get it in time, he and his wife rebooked their flights through Portugal.
“The communication (about the new regulations) has been poor, because we’re just finding out about this now,” said Crawford, 78.
“I think a lot of people will have travel plans for March and April, who are just beginning to find out about this, and have the same dilemma that we have. There isn’t enough time to get a British passport, (so) if you’re going to the U.K., you may have to cancel your plans.”
Elizabeth Thompson is 90, and has been planning a trip to the U.K. with her two granddaughters in November.
“This was going to be my last trip ever,” said Thompson, who was born in Belfast, Northern Island and moved to Canada in 1957.
“My granddaughters have never been to London. They’ve been everywhere else in the world, but they’ve never been to London. So I thought, ‘Oh well, it’ll be my 91st birthday.’
“And then the British government threw this out. I don’t know how the devil they are going to keep up with issuing all these passports, because there must be hundreds of thousands of people all over the world who were born in the U.K. and now suddenly need a passport.”
She is so ticked off about the passport mess that she is considering an alternative.
“I’m just so mad at the Brits that I’m going to say, ‘Stuff your passport, I’ll get an Irish passport,’” said Thompson, who has never had an Irish passport.
The United States has a U.S. Customs and Border Protection checkpoint at the Vancouver airport, so if you get stopped from entering the U.S. you are still in Canada.
But there is no similar U.K. facility at YVR, so it will be up to individual airlines to screen passengers to see if they have the proper passports or documents before boarding.
There are an estimated 460,000 Canadians who were born in the U.K.