S1 E6 What can the Hong Kong BN(O) visa tell us about borders and belonging in Britain today?

 

When National Security Law was imposed in Hong Kong SAR in 2020, the UK government responded by opening up a bespoke visa scheme to facilitate the migration and settlement of Hong Kongers in the UK. Upheld by the UK’s Home Office as evidence of the UK’s ‘fair and generous’ approach to immigration, on the surface it seems like an exception to the Hostile Environment. But what if all was not as it seems?  

In this episode, we explore the back story to this new visa, to ask the question what can the Hong Kong BN(O) visa tell us about Britain’s borders past and present? Presenter Michaela Benson uncovers how Britain’s present-day relationship to the people of Hong Kong sits in a longer history through which the Hong Kongers had their rights eroded. George Kalivis heads into the archives to uncover how the British government responded to earlier political uprisings in Hong Kong, the 1989 protests about the Tiananmen Square massacres. And they are joined by John Vassiliou, an immigration and nationality lawyer at Shepherd and Wedderburn, who explains more about the bespoke HK BN(O) visa scheme and why it means that this is pegged to a so-called ‘useless citizenship’ status.  

You can access the full transcripts for each episode over on the Rebordering Britain and Britons after Brexit website.  

 

In this episode we cover …  

• Britain’s relationship to people of Hong Kong from the 1960s onwards 
• The Hong Kong BN(O) visa  
• Useless citizenships 

Quote 

When we think of a typical citizen of a country they usually have certain benefits like I described—and the main one is the right to live there—and a BN(O) citizen does not.  They are not on their own, there are another four types of British citizenship status that are in a similar category to this and they’ve generally been described by courts as useless citizenship statuses in the past.  

 — John Vassiliou  

Where can you find out more about the topics in today’s episod