Immigration Lawyer Blog
Britain could be the first country in the European Union that will introduce passports which do not contain details of the holder’s sex. The move has been proposed because some people have not yet decided whether they are male or female. This is a cause for worry for them at the airports’ border control.
The Liberal Democrats party that has lost its supporters is seems to have invented a method to leave its trace in the country’s history. The coalition government decided to introduce amendments to the passports of Britons on the initiative of the Liberal Democrats.
The citizens of Britain are issued dark red passports, which are like the Russian ones in colour, to travel abroad. Like in passports of all European states, it also has notification of the holder’s sex. Politicians insist on abolishing this information. The column “sex” will remain but instead of M for male and F for female there will be simply a cross. The Liberal Democrats believe this move will defend the rights of people who are undergoing a sex change operation or who have both male and female sexual organs. These people have to inscribe all these intimate details to border guards, who sometimes cannot grasp how this is possible when a woman is standing before them and hands over her passport with a photograph of a male. Although the number of such people is not so high, the Liberal Democrats suggest introducing a gender-free passport for all citizens unexceptionally.
Some officials of the Home Office oppose the move saying that the British border guards, who are working under constant tension owing to terrorist threats in the country, will have to do additional work with the identification of the personality. However, the supporters of the new move insist that details of the passport holder’s sex are not important at all. They point to the identity card issued to all British servicemen, which contains all details of its holder but no information about the holder’s gender.
According to the Home Office officials, no final decision has been taken yet about the amendments to the passport.
In fact, they will have an opportunity to study how this innovation has materialized in the former British colony, Australia. The holder of an Australian passport can write x – unidentified gender on the column of sex or ordinary identification male or female. This is a responsibility of a citizen and his physician because surgery to change the sex is unnecessary to make amendments to passport details. According to the clergy, the innovation not only defies Divine law but also commonsense.