countries of origin, including at consulates in the UK, which makes people very reluctant to approach them to resolve documentation issues or register the births of children. Cases were reported of Romani people attempting to obtain documentation from their countries of origin/nationality but finding the associated procedures complicated, lengthy, and sometimes impossible to navigate. 42. There is also a lack of targeted and accessible information reaching the Romani community in the UK to explain relevant laws, policies, and procedures. Risk of statelessness in the Brexit context 43. The risk of childhood statelessness in the UK could be increased or exacerbated by Brexit, including for children of Romani families.63 Children born in the UK to parents from any EU country whose nationality cannot be verified or documented may face difficulties post-Brexit. Coram Children’s Legal Centre highlighted a case, which shows how some children with an EU-citizen and a British parent may be unable to document their nationality of either country, including in situations of domestic abuse when acquisition of nationality requires an action from both parents.64 Roma Support Group reports that many parents they work with did not know that they needed to apply to the EU Settled Status scheme [or for British citizenship] to ensure that their children did not fall into an irregular status after Brexit. Some Romani children have applied for British citizenship since Brexit but been refused for a lack of identity documents. The impact of possible amendments under the Nationality and Borders Bill 44. The Nationality & Borders Bill (NBB),65 currently under review in the UK Parliament, has attracted criticism from human rights groups, including those advocating to end statelessness. Although there are some positive aspects of the NBB in relation to other groups, two clauses in particular have the potential to worsen statelessness in the UK as well as unnecessarily leaving more children in limbo, exposed to the detrimental impacts of growing up without a nationality. 45. The proposed Clause 10 of the NBB inserts a new Paragraph 3A into Schedule 2 of the British Nationality Act 1981 for stateless children aged 5-17, requiring that the Secretary of State be ‘satisfied’ that the child is unable to acquire another nationality before they may be permitted to register as a British citizen. The current legislation refers to children who ‘would be born stateless’.66 Clause 10 would unnecessarily restrict the vital safeguard intended to protect the rights and best interests of children born stateless in the UK and is clearly not intended to prevent or reduce childhood statelessness as it does not address any of these identified issues.67 In fact, it has the potential to prolong and even increase instances of childhood statelessness, contravening Article 3 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the 1961 Convention. 63 ibid Lagrue et al (2020), Children left out? Securing children’s rights to stay in the UK beyond Brexit, Coram Children’s Legal Centre, p.7: https://www.childrenslegalcentre.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/CCLC-Children-left-out_July-2020_final.pdf 65 Nationality and Borders Bill (as amended in Public Bill Committee), Government Bill originated in the House of Commons, Session 2021-22: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/cbill/58-02/0187/210187v1.pdf 66 British Nationality Act 1981, paragraph 1, Schedule 2. 67 UNHCR (2022), ‘UNHCR Updated Observations on the Nationality and Borders Bill, as amended – updated January 2022’, para. 74: https://www.unhcr.org/61e7f9b44 64 11