Last year, I was instructed by a long-standing client to apply for British Citizenship based on historical legislative unfairness. It’s worth noting that my client lived in the UAE and had never resided in the United Kingdom. As a Pakistani national, she qualified for the Ancestry visa however, could not reside in the UK for 5 years as it meant she would need to leave her elderly father who could not join her in the UK. For context, my client's mother passed away circa 10 years ago, never having the chance to claim her right to British Citizenship.

My client had always felt robbed of the opportunity to become a British Citizen because her grandmother who was a British Citizen born in the UK in the early 1900’s was not entitled to pass her British Citizenship on to her daughter at the time of her birth. My client's mother was born overseas to a British mother who was born within the British Commonwealth (empire). As many of you readers will know, before the British Nationality Act 1981 commenced on 1 January 1983, British nationality law discriminated against women and children born to them, British Citizenship could only be derived from the father.

Having legally corroborated my client’s ability to register as a British Citizen, I embarked upon making this application on my client's behalf, relying on the new addition to the 1981 Act, Section 4L of the British Nationality Act 1981. Section 4L seemingly offered a potential route to British citizenship for adults with a UK-born grandmother who missed out due to historical legislative unfairness. The question on both of our minds was, this law surely stated that it was designed to correct legislative unfairness, but was it too good to be true? Could she register as a British Citizen when her grandmother was not entitled to pass her citizenship to her mother? I remained secretly hopeful and determined to put all my legal muster into making this client's dream come true.

Together with evidence of my client's maternal lineage and my legal arguments, the application was sent off to UKVI Liverpool. I cautioned my client not to get her hopes up, concerned that a decision would be made at the Home Office’s discretion and could easily be made against her. The wait was a dreary one, as days turned into months, many, many months without any correspondence in return. Dread began to set in that the application had perhaps fallen through the cracks, gone ignored and my client's dreams would crash and burn. I too began to feel responsible for correcting the wrong her grandmother had suffered for simply being female.

Then one day, long behold … we arrived at a decision

Needless to say, my client was beyond words on my phone call congratulating her for registering as a British Citizen. Having found her composure, she said " I knew it, I had to know, I had to try and fight for my right....this one was for you, Mum, I did this you".

This brave decision changed the course of my client's life. Having lived her entire adult in a country that entitles you to many benefits through its residency visa, but can never give you a sense of permanence, my client found a new place to call home. The moral of this story is, if you want to bring about change in your life, start by taking the first step because if you don't try, you'll always be pondering.