Every British citizen is either a British citizen otherwise than by descent or a British citizen by descent.
This difference is important because the type of citizenship people have decides the way in which they can pass British citizenship on to their children who were born outside the United Kingdom.
A British citizen otherwise than by descent, can automatically pass on British citizenship to a child born outside the UK. You can be a British Citizen otherwise than by descent by:
- Birth
- Registration
- Naturalization
- Adoption.
A British citizen by descent is a person born outside the UK and is acquired if one or both parents are British citizens. This means that you cannot automatically pass on British citizenship to any child who is born abroad. You are a British citizen by descent if:
- You are born outside the UK to a parent who was a British citizen at the time;
- It does not matter whether the birth took place before or after 1 January 1983 as long as a child who was born before that date became a British citizen on that date;
- On 31 December 1982, he or she was a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies through:
- his or her own birth, or
- a parent's or a grandparent's birth,
- legal adoption
- naturalisation
- registration
- You lived in the UK while a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies for five years at any time before 1 January 1983, and was not subject to restrictions under the immigration laws at the end of that five year period.
- You are a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies by connection with the Falkland Islands and Dependencies (i.e. South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands).
To prove your relationship with father you may use:-
Documents may include two or more affidavits of birth (sworn letters written by relatives or other persons with personal knowledge of the facts of a child’s birth), as well as medical records, school records, and religious records (such as certificate of baptism issued by a church) showing the names of the mother and the child.
If alternative documents are not available or sufficiently credible (believable), the UK government may require that the mother and child obtain a blood test from a laboratory accredited by the American Association of Blood Banks (AABB). Such a test, though not routinely requested, would at least prove that the mother and child could be directly related. If it is requested of you, you should know that refusing to take the test would be interpreted as evidence of ineligibility, except if you do so for legitimate religious reasons. (The fact that the test is expensive is not reason enough.)
Finally, if none of the options above seems conclusive, the U.S. government may suggest that the mother and child obtain a DNA test from a laboratory accredited by the AABB. Such a test, though voluntary, would provide definitive proof of a biological father-child relationship.
