To ask you to explain why someone would renounce citizenship of a country?

[InTheBox]

This is more out of curiosity than anything in particular. I'm under the impression that it's possible to hold citizenship for more than one country, so what would be the point in renouncing one's citizenship if it didn't really make a difference iyswim?

Did Boris Johnson renounce his US citizenship? I read somewhere that he was going to but haven't seen anything since.

oh god...we are just trying to sort out the american tax business...we just discovered all the rule changes and are terrified they will go after us.

I think DH will just do the minimum required cough up whatever ridiculous sum they demand then renounce.

I was supposed to choose between my two nationalities (British and Finnish) when I turned 18 but luckily they changed the law before then and allow dual nationality now. I can understand why someone would want to give up their Finnish citizenship as if you're male you have to National Service and if you don't turn up they will issue a warrant for your arrest (happened to me because I was accidentally registered as male when I was born!)

DD was born in Finland and I never bothered to register her birth with the British Consulate as it costs a fair bit so she doesn't have a birth certificate (Finland doesn't do birth certificates at all, always a hassle when we fly to the UK as I always get asked for her BC at border control) or British passport. I lost my British passport years ago and haven't bothered to renew it - too expensive and too much hassle, my Finnish one is much cheaper and easier to renew.

madameginger
I can have Irish citizenship if I want as my parents are both Irish but I've never seen the need to apply

I've just this morning gone through the rules for this scenario. My current understanding is that you don't need to apply or even register on the Foreign Births Register. You are automatically an Irish citizen.

I have emailed the Irish Embassy in London to check.

I want to apply for an Irish passport so trying to get my "papers" sorted.

Natsku- my dd doesn't have one either. I knew from my former job with the Nationality Office she didn't need one to prove her citizenship so I never bothered. She had a wee flimsy thing from the town hall where we live but we lost it.

Mind you, here in Italy, to get her an Italian ID card which is valid for travel within Europe they just asked us for (iirc) 5 euro and rubber stamped a card. They asked us who her Italian parent was (dp) and he produced his ID card and that was it. No proof or anything, we could have been anyone.

Needless to say I haven't bothered renewing her UK ppt...5 euro versus god knows how much it is now for a UK one....no brainer. Obviously if/when she travels outside Europe I'll get her either a UK ppt again, or an Italian one, whichever is cheaper.

5 euros, nice!

IIRC, there was a survey done towards the end of last year which found that a British passport gives you the most access to other countries, in terms of not needing visas/being able to acquire visas etc (From memory, South Sudan is the worst.) One of the things about having a British passport for me, though, is that most of the countries I need to go to are the ones with bloody expensive and convoluted visa processes for the British - and free/inexpensive ones for Canadians and Kiwis

I believe both Greece and Turkey require dual nationals to do National Service: and iirc, the only other nationality you can hold alongside Russian is Israeli - though that may have changed now. Didn't the US only use to permit Canada and the UK at one stage too?

If any of you are - like me - bemoaning the fact you are only entitled to a single nationality, don't forget that as British passport holders, we can hold more than 1 UK ten year passport, as long as you can prove you need it for travel to incompatible countries (ie Israel and Syria/Lebanon/Libya/Sudan/Saudi ) or travel a lot for work and need to passports because of applications for visas etc I have held two for over 20 years- you need a letter from your employer to take them out initially, but after that, you can renew both simultaneously without: if you try to do them separately, though, you need to provide a new letter etc The UK is pretty unique in this respect -afaik, the US, for example, will issue you an additional passport, but it's not a full one and is time limited.

I think the US used to be funny about dual nationality except in the case of being born a dual national. I remember my dm not wanting to become a British citizen because it would mean renouncing her US citizenship.