A.—s

540

after years and years goes into another Colony, finds that he has no privilege of British citizenship whatsoever. That is a very undesirable state of affairs. With regard to the people naturalized in Great Britain : they have an advantage, I take it, under your Act of 1870. If they go to any Colony they have all the rights and privileges of British citizenship. lam glad to understand, if I interpret your remarks aright, that you are prepared to consider what has been said by Sir Joseph Ward in that direction. There should be no difficulty in arriving at a common term, or common period, of naturalization which would be acceptable to all portions of the British Empire. It is a fact that, in Great Britain, you may naturalize an alien of non-European extraction, and if there would be any possibility of your modifying that clause in your Bill so as not to allow him, ipso facto, to claim the rights of British citizenship in British possessions, it would meet a great many of us to a very large extent. Then there would be a possibility of the Home Government introducing a Bill, fixing, say, upon a certain period of five years, and other terms to be agreed upon, and practically without special legislation in the other Colonies or Dominions, it would only be necessary to pass a resolution or a clause adopting the Home Act, which really would allow anybody naturalized in any portion of the British Empire, who was of European extraction, and had resided the specified period of time, ipso facto to have all the privileges of British citizenship in any part of the British Empire to which he went. I might give you a very strong case indeed. We had in the Cape Colony a very notable alien in the person of the late Colonel Schermbrucker. He was naturalized as a British subject, and became a Minister of the Crown. To everybody it must appear as most undesirable that if, during his lifetime, he had gone, say, to the Colony of New Zealand, or to the Colony of Australia, he would have had to be re-naturalized, and could not have claimed the privilege of British citizenship. I believe such is the law as it exists at the present time. I should like to have Mr. Deakin's view upon the question of an alien, naturalized in Cape Colony (no matter how high a post he held in that Colony) if he went to Australia, and, being of alien birth, his British citizenship in the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope would not give him the privilege of British citizenship in the Commonwealth of Australia. Mr. DEAKIN : I think that is so. Mr. GLADSTONE : Yes, I think it is so. Dr. SMARTT : I think it will appeal to everybody that that is a very desirable thing to alter. I know of many cases of the same kind, and it is because we feel that these cases will lead to friction that we do hope the Imperial Government will draft a Bill which will be acceptable practically to all the Dominions, so that it will be only necessary for the Colonies to adopt the principles of the Imperial Bill, thereby giving all the privileges of British citizenship throughout the Empire. Mr. GLADSTONE : The Bill as now drawn is with the object of meeting that point. Dr. SMARTT : If you can meet the case of the non-European, it will at once simplify the matter. Mr. GLADSTONE : That is a matter of very considerable difficulty, for reasons which I need not state. I think it would simplify matters, but that is the point we have to consider, and to get round in some way, in order to meet the views of the different Colonies.

Fourteenth Day. 0 May 1907.

Naturalization. (Dr. Smartt.)