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Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Bill [HL]

Perhaps I may, first, assure the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, that the response has been dispatched and I have knowledge of it, but it may be easier for the matter to be dealt with on Report, when we have had sight of the reply. Our position on Amendment 56A is that it is not necessary to specify in the Bill the circumstances in which a person will be treated as having a relevant family association on the date of application for naturalisation, even though the association had ceased to exist before that date. Clause 38 contains a power for the Secretary of State to apply discretion in cases where a relevant family association may have ceased before the date of the application and nevertheless allow a person to be naturalised, despite them not being able to meet this requirement. The Secretary of State is provided with the power to use this discretion flexibly in exceptional circumstances and in respect of the specific circumstances of a case. We do not wish to set down in regulations particular classes of cases where the discretion will normally be used, as the expectation is that discretion will be applied only in exceptional circumstances. We will, however, set down in advance, and make publicly available, guidance regarding the circumstances in which this discretion may be applied. The noble Baroness raised a question concerning the rights of the child, but I have to confess that I am not currently in a position to provide the information that she wants. As she rightly said, that matter will be part of the debate on a later amendment and later clause. I hope that the noble Baroness will feel able to withdraw the amendment.