“You will be considered to be of sound mind if you have the ability to make your own decisions. You should understand the step you are taking in applying for British nationality.”
Life in the UK test is not the only requirement to become British; you also need to be of sound mind. As a matter of fact, not many people realize what kind of step that really is. A lot of people tend to mix up two notions: “become a British citizen” and “get a British passport”. While one is impossible without the other, - you can only hold a British passport if you’re British citizen* - being British actually involves many responsibilities which may be too overwhelming. One of these responsibilities is that you become elegible for jury duty. And jury duty takes, on average, 2 weeks, for which your employer doesn’t have to pay you!
If you saw what happened to Demi Moore in “The Juror”, you may reconsider the whole idea of becoming British. Although the movie takes place in the US, nothing guarantees you that the same story couldn’t happen in the UK.
In many cases, it may be a better idea to remain Permanent resident, without becoming citizen. For example, if you’re Swiss, Monegasque, Sanmarinese, Andorran, or Liechtensteiner. Your current citizenships are way cooler than UK, - immigration officers worldwide wave Swiss citizens through without even looking inside their passports, - just at the mere sight of their bright-red Schweizer Pass. It seems that the red colour was chosen just for that - to make it more noticeable in a crowd of brown.
By the way, British passports are sixth in terms of travel facility, - according to the Henley Visa Restriction index (2008). Want to be Number 1? Become a Dane. (By the way, Denmark has a “Life in Denmark” test, too. There are things you just can’t escape… The good thing is that unlike Life in the UK, the Danish citizenship test consists in answering questions that have been made public, which makes it unlikely that you will be asked something like
“D-Plates indicate, in Wales:
left-handed driver;
provisional license;
drunk driver;
blind driver”
*simplistic; there is a variety of British passports, and you can get one even if you have never been to the UK.
People often ask, “Is there a way to avoid Life in the UK test?” The answer is Yes. The easiest way - wait until you’re 65. If you’re 65 or older, you don’t have to take the Life in the UK test. A slightly more complex solution: you can also skip it if you show that you have permanent disability or mental impairment (the latter shouldn’t be hard to get once you start memorizing all you need to know for the test). Your other options:
Get beaten regularly by your domestic partner before you apply for residency. (Do
wnload your form here)
Become a Gurkha. (Of course, you’d need to become Nepalese first).
Become a Gurkha’s husband, wife or civil partner. (i.e. lesbian Gurkhas save £34).
Simply be rich and retire in UK: nobody will care if you understand the system of government, - especially if you keep your money in an Icelandic bank.
There are other ways to avoid Life in the UK test, - you can also become Turkish, or get yourself a British son or a grandson, etc. There is obviously no need for all these people to know the origin of Santa Claus, or any other life-saving facts from the citizenship test.
According to Cititest.com, a training site for the British citizenship test, one of the Life in the UK test questions that always triggers users’ reactions, is the question about the minimum age required to work. Life in the UK textbook says:
“The earliest legal age for children to do paid work is set at 14. There are a few exceptions that allow children under the age of 14 to work legally and these include specific work in performing, modelling, sport and agriculture.”
So, if you are asked if a 12 years old child can work, the answer is Yes. According to the statistics, approximately 1% of UK workforce - approx. 30 million people - works in agriculture, compared to 74% working in services, and 25% in the industrial sector. So it may not be that important if a few 10-years-olds somewhere in Wales are picking carrots every now and then, and get a couple of pennies for it. But they do work, and it’s legal. Thus logically, there is NO minimum age to work in the UK. You can model even if you just came out of an uterus. Look at the Terms and Conditions of BabyModels UK:
3.5 The Model shall keep the Company informed of any significant changes in his/her appearance to include (but not limited to) notification of any change of hair style/colour, weight loss/gain or addition of tattoo or any other visible feature (such as a piercing) and agrees to regularly update their pictures accordingly.
So, if you’re thinking of giving your baby a piercing for Christmas, make sure you notify the agent. And keep the tattoos discreet. There are several other questions where a clear answer may be hard to come up with; but whoever takes Life in the UK test must know that there are 24 questions in total; the passmark is 75%, which means that you are allowed 6 wrong answers. It is very unlikely that you will get 6 “problematic” questions. Maybe one, perhaps two. So don’t worry about getting to the bottom of children’s employment legislation, new smoking laws, of fox hunting prohibitions. Life in the UK test may be an irritating exam to pass, especially since it requires newcomers to know way more than the aboriginal population. But it’s not that hard at all. In fact, most people pass it from the first attempt.
Since the launch of Life in the UK test, and especially since the moment when it also became mandatory for those seeking permanent residency in the UK, - and not only for aspiring citizens - it suscitated many critical reviews. Everything was wrong - the text of the official manual had lots of factual mistakes, let alone imprecisions or tournures that were hard to understand for a non-native speaker. For example, nobody could figure out who was the head of the Church of England, according to the manual. Or, better said, nobody knew what to answer if such question showed up. This nonsensical uncertainty remains: when you see a question on the screen, and failure costs 34 pounds, plus delays, of course - you really want to be sure that you give the right answer, but WHAT is the right answer - what’s really true or what’s in the book?
What about the laws, or regulations, that changed since the introduction of the test, or better said, since the new edition of the manual? (More about these cases in our future posts). What happens if one of the 54 countries forming the British Commonwealth leaves it tomorrow - should the answer reflect the actual truth and the updated number, or should we stick to the “Life in the UK” manual?
In legal terms, the test is NOT based on anything BUT the official manual, Life in the United Kingdom - A journey to citizenship, and not the entire manual, but merely a few chapters. If it’s not in these chapters (2 to 6), then it’s not in the test. And noone can be obliged to follow the news, have an interest in Commonwealth policies or, say, tobacco laws. Therefore, the logical answer is, - always give the answer that can be located in the manual, even if you know it to be false. It is unlikely that you will be able to correct your results by showing an article cut out of a newspaper. But you will definitely have a point if you show the text of the manual.
