MK (A Child By Her Litigation Friend CAE), R (On the Application O... 10 of 12 http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2017/1365.html respectively under consideration the meaning of statelessness within art 1(1) was neither determinative nor directly relevant. Our law is a dualist system, and neither the 1954 nor the 1961 Convention has as such been incorporated, so the Conventions are not part of the law, and the UNHCR guidance is not a source of English (or United Kingdom) law. 35. What the Secretary of State is not entitled in my judgment to do is to say that in both s 40(4) of, and paragraph 3 of Schedule 2 to, the 1981 Act, and in Part 14 of the Immigration Rules, the notion of statelessness is to be determined in accordance with its meaning in art 1(1) of the 1954 Convention, but that it has different meanings in those different provisions. But that is what she seeks to do. In Al-Jeddah there is no sign, so far as I can see, that the Secretary of State argued that 'stateless' in s 40(4) should not have the same meaning as in the 1954 Convention: the crux of the argument was on surrounding issues, that is to say the procedure of determining the issue and the cause of the statelessness. The Secretary of State's guidance on Part 14 of the Rules, which needs to follow the meaning of the term in the 1954 Convention, makes it clear that she applies the UNHCR guidance on the meaning of 'stateless'. In the present case, as noted above, it is specifically conceded that the meaning of statelessness is to be determined in the same way. There is no room for applying a different meaning. 'Stateless' means, in the provisions with which I am concerned, the same as it means in the provisions with which the Supreme Court was concerned in Al-Jeddah. What it means in those provisions is determined by the Supreme Court in Al-Jeddah, which is obviously binding on me. The Secretary of State has made the matter even plainer by her adoption of the UNHCR guidance in relation to decisions made in under the Rules. The same meaning must apply to all the cases in which the matter is to be determined in accordance with the meaning in the Convention. Conclusion on the meaning and effect of paragraph 3 of Schedule 2 to the 1981 Act. 36. The conclusions from what is set out above are as follows. For the purposes of the statutory provisions in issue, a person is stateless if he has no nationality. Ability to acquire a nationality is irrelevant for these purposes. A child born on or after 3 December 2004, outside India, of parents at least one of whom is an Indian national, and who has not been to India, is not an Indian national unless registration of the birth has taken place in accordance with the provisions of the Citizenship Act 1955 (India) as amended. If the child has no other nationality, the child is stateless for the purposes of paragraph 3 of Schedule 2 to the British Nationality Act 1981 and, if the other requirements of that paragraph are met, is entitled to be registered as a British citizen. If, therefore, C's birth had on the date of the decision under challenge not been registered, she is entitled to British Citizenship 37. I recognise of course that this conclusion opens an obvious route to abuse. Indeed, the facts of the present case might be said to be an example of abuse. M and F are both overstayers. Both have sought, and been refused, further leave. They have preferred to allow C to be stateless all her life to date rather than to register her birth and obtain Indian nationality for her. Yet C's right to British nationality (and the consequence that she will not be or become a national of India) will now immeasurably improve M and F's prospects of being allowed to stay in the United Kingdom. But the Secretary of State's position in this case on the one hand, and the authorities on the other, necessarily lead to this result. The Secretary of State's procedure. 38. Given the importance of actual nationality rather than the ability to acquire it, a claimant's ability to show that he or she meets the statutory requirement of not having or having had any nationality becomes an individual issue. If the question depended on the possibility of the acquisition of nationality it could be answered, or largely answered, by an examination of the relevant foreign law; but if it depends on actual acquisition, the foreign law is merely the background against which the individual's actual acts and their effect are to be seen. 39. In the present case, the Secretary of State has made it clear in correspondence before the decision, the decision itself, and a supplementary letter of 12 October 2016, that in order to consider an 20/05/2021, 15:49