The new citizenship law

Uganda to export nurses to Europe
TABU BUTAGIRA & JULIUS MUCUNGUZI
KUALA LUMPUR/KAMPALA
UGANDA could soon start exporting nurses to formally work in Europe under a new Commonwealth-crafted initiative endorsed at an international professional's convention in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, yesterday.The Pan-Commonwealth conference on trade in professional services also selected neighbouring Kenya, Malawi and Mauritius as the only other African countries to pilot the scheme. At least 30 nurses from each of the beneficiary countries stand to get four-year work placements, mainly in the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland but the number of beneficiaries could be varied in subsequent years.

HEALTH MINISTER: MallingaDr Michael Davenport, an expert hired by the Commonwealth Secretariat to assemble the proposal, explained that the European countries would partner with and finance training of the targeted African health workers who, upon graduation, would then be seconded to relocate overseas.It is envisaged the cross-continental arrangement would be a win-win situation where African nurses are offered better paying jobs and professional mentoring while they work to bridge the glaring labour shortage afflicting the health sector in Europe.[source :The monitor]

Ayoub mzee at the Home office briefing
Major changes proposed to the way foreign nationals achieve British citizenship.

Ayoub mzee with the HOME OFFICE minister for immigration during an interview
That research found that most people want new residents to speak English, pay their way, obey the law and give something back to their communities.

HON David Lammy MP David Lammy is the Member of Parliament for Tottenham, Minister for Skills in the new Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills.

A government green paper released today - The path to citizenship (new window) - proposes to build on those suggestions, starting with a 'citizenship contract' that would set out each new citizen's rights and responsibilities.
My co presenter Davon Knusden with the minister
Key elements are:
Other proposed changes include:
creating a three-stage route to citizenship, including a new 'probationary period'
requiring immigrants to either show that they've contributed something to the UK, or leave the country
denying public benefits to immigrants who haven't received full citizenship


requiring immigrants to prove they can speak English
barring those convicted of serious crimes from receiving citizenship
requiring those convicted of minor crimes to spend more time on citizenship probation
requiring immigrants to contribute to a fund devoted to managing the impact of immigration
speeding the citizenship process for immigrants who get involved in their local communities through volunteering

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said the proposals were 'clear and fair.'
'The rights and benefits of citizenship will be available to those who can demonstrate a commitment to our shared values, and a willingness to contribute to the community,' she said. 'This is a country of liberty and tolerance, opportunity and diversity - and these values are reinforced by the expectation that all who live here should learn our language, play by the rules, obey the law and contribute to the community.'

GORDON BROWN, the british Prime Minister said:

"The vision of British citizenship that I believe in - and that I believe will make us even prouder of Britain - is founded on a unifying idea of rights matched with responsibilities. And I want also to describe what that concept of citizenship means for managing migration: that for people coming to Britain, and wanting to become British, citizenship should not only be a matter of their choice but should depend upon actively entering into a contract through which, by virtue of responsibilities accepted, the right of citizenship is earned."



"Indeed, building our secure and prosperous future as a nation will benefit from not just common values we share but a strong sense of national purpose. And for that to happen we need to be forthright - and yes confident - about what brings us together not only as inhabitants of these islands but as citizens of this society. Indeed there is a real danger that while other countries gain from having a clear definition of their destiny in a fast changing global economy, we may lose out if we prove slow to express and live up to the British values that can move us to act together."


" So the surest foundation upon which we can advance socially, culturally and economically in this century is to be far more explicit about the ties - indeed the shared values - that make us more than a collection of people but a country.This is not jingoism, but practical, rational and purposeful - and therefore, I would argue, an essentially British form of patriotism.
Patriotism is the sense that 'all-of-us' matters more than 'any-of-us'. It defines a nation not by race or ethnicity, but by seeing us all as part of a collective project from which we all gain and to which we all contribute. Society is - as the great thinkers have long told us - a contract, even a covenant, in which we recognise that our destinies are interlinked. For rights only exist where people recognise responsibilities; responsibilities only exist where people have a sense of shared fate; and shared fate only exists where "

New Points System Begins
Wed, 06 Feb 2008 13:08:25 Details of Britain’s new Australian-style points based immigration system (PBS)