British passports are being ‘cheapened’ by the Home Office‘s ‘soft touch’ citizenship system, campaigners said today.
Last year, migrants from more than 200 countries – including Nepal, North Korea and Fiji – were rubber-stamped as British in the year ending September 2025.
More than 55,000 came from India, Pakistan and Nigeria alone – enough to fill towns the size of Horsham, Dunstable and Clacton.
The figures have raised further questions about Britain’s citizenship process, which has been embroiled in scandal over Keir Starmer‘s handling of the case of Egyptian dissident Alaa Abd El-Fattah.
He was granted citizenship in 2021 despite calling for the murder of Jews and police officers. The 44-year-old also voiced his hatred of white people in a series of vulgar outbursts on social media.
Freed from jail in Egypt following a long campaign, El-Fattah was welcomed back by the Prime Minister when he landed in London on Boxing Day.
Robert Bates, of the Centre for Migration Control, told the Daily Mail: ‘The whole world seems to be getting in on Britain’s soft touch pathway to citizenship.
‘This has caused the value of a British passport to be cheapened and awarded to those who are, quite frankly, not British.
Keir Starmer’s government is battling a huge backlash over the handling of Egyptian dissident Alaa Abd El-Fattah (pictured in 2015)
‘The soaring grant numbers show Starmer’s government is happy to throw around passports like confetti, but as we have seen with extremists like El-Fattah, not all of these applicants should have been approved in the first place.
‘It is far too easy for migrants to obtain British citizenship after just a few years in the country, and the whole process needs a radical overhaul.’
Statistics from the Home Office show that the number of citizenship applications being granted was as low as 15,000 in the early 1960s.
But this has spiralled to the two highest numbers on record under Labour’s watch, with 269,000 in 2024 and 241,000 for the year ending September 2025.
The two biggest surges over the decades came in the New Labour era of the late 1990s and early 2000s and in the post-2020 immigration boom.
The number of people now being approved as British is enough to fill cities the size of Newcastle, Brighton or Plymouth each year – double levels seen a decade ago.
Most citizenship grants come from the naturalisation process, which most people become eligible for a year after achieving permanent residence, which itself normally takes five years.
This means a surge in citizenship grants usually comes years after a spike in immigration numbers.
Once immigrants become British citizens, they can live and work in the UK free of any immigration controls.
The outcry over Britain’s lax citizenship system has only intensified the backlash Sir Keir has received for saying El-Fattah was ‘welcome’ in the UK
They can also apply for a British passport, register to vote in all forms of elections and referenda, and share in all the other rights and responsibilities of their status.
But Home Office inspectors have previously warned that citizenships have been handed out to thousands of illegal immigrants and foreign criminals without basic checks.
One case unearthed involved staff accepting an application from an asylum-seeker – unaware that he had admitted to a fatal stabbing in his homeland.
The surging numbers come as the El-Fattah scandal rumbled on last week, causing panic in the government as Labour scrambled to respond.
El-Fattah was granted British citizenship in 2021, while in jail in Egypt for ‘spreading fake news’, on the basis that his mother was born in the UK.
He landed in the UK on Boxing Day after almost 12 years continuously in Egyptian jails due to expressing his opposition to the treatment of dissidents by the government.
Sir Keir Starmer posted a statement saying he was ‘delighted’ by El Fattah’s arrival in the UK the day after his arrival.
But within minutes, critics unearthed a string of vile historical online posts from the activist.
In 2010 he called for ‘the killing of all Zionists, including civilians’. He described the British as ‘dogs and monkeys’, and spoke of his hatred for white people, boasting he was ‘proud of being racist against whites’.
Tory leader Kemi Badenoch has since acknowledged it was a mistake to give him citizenship, but said the decision was ‘rubber-stamped’ by officials without escalating the case to the then home secretary Priti Patel.
Alaa Abd el-Fattah stands next to his mother, Laila Soueif, and sister, Sanaa, at home in Giza, Egypt
Has the UK made it too easy for anyone to become a citizen, and what should change about the process?
She said it was ‘inconceivable’ that no-one in Government was aware of El-Fattah’s previous statements, adding: ‘Another serious problem is that there will be junior officials and decision-makers within parts of the Civil Service who hold these views, or see nothing wrong with them.’
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has faced calls to remove El-Fattah’s British nationality after it emerged he could have his Egyptian citizenship removed, making it impossible to deport him from Britain under international law.
Most citizenship grants come from the naturalisation process, which most people become eligible for a year after achieving permanent residence, which itself normally takes five years.
This means spiking citizenship grants usually come years after a spike in immigration numbers.
They can then apply for a British passport, register to vote in all forms of elections and referenda, and share in all the other rights and responsibilities of their status.
Discussing the current system, Mr Bates said: ‘The standard naturalisation time needs to be increased to eighteen years.
‘Even then a passport should only be provided once a far more stringent set of criteria are met that demonstrate complete assimilation into British culture and a veneration of our heritage.’
El-Fattah issued a partial apology for his online rants, which are being assessed by the Metropolitan Police.
But he also ‘liked’ a post on Facebook claiming that he is the victim of a ‘campaign launched by the Zionists’.
El-Fattah’s case has been a personal crusade for Sir Keir, with him raising the case in the Commons in 2022.
The Conservatives branded El-Fattah a ‘scumbag’ who should be deported.
Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick said: ‘It beggars belief that Starmer still “welcomes” this anti-British, anti-white, anti-Semitic extremist to our country. It’s clear he won’t revoke his citizenship, won’t deport him and doesn’t regret bringing him here.’
Reform UK pledged a change in the law to make it easier to deport dual nationals ‘who have expressed vile and anti-British views’.
El-Fattah’s case is notable because he was granted British citizenship in 2021 on the basis that his mother, Laila Soueif, was born in the UK while her mother was studying here as a student.
This meant the family was able to apply for her to transmit her citizenship to her son, even though he was living abroad at the time, under a little-known immigration law.
The obscure route also meant that El-Fattah would not have to go through the usual vetting and ‘good character’ tests faced by migrants who took a different route.
He avoided it following a landmark European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) case in which an American murderer defeated the British Government.
Mr Bates added: ‘It is not the place of a foreign court to tell elected politicians which individuals should be entitled to British citizenship.
‘There is no doubt that a large number of recent grants are the result of spurious claims under Article 8, and the only way to end this madness is to withdraw entirely from the ECHR.’
In November, Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood announced plans to make it take longer for migrants to get settled status – a precursor to citizenship.
The plans will double the minimum qualifying period from five to ten years of lawful residence, with the expectation that migrants should be in work and contributing if they wish to settle.
Illegal migrants could have to wait 30 years for settlement and migrants who claim benefits could wait up to 20 years to settle.
A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘These numbers are due to the unacceptably high levels of net migration in recent years, which has since fallen by two-thirds under this government.
‘As the Home Secretary has said, becoming a British citizen is a privilege, not a right.
‘We recently announced the biggest overhaul of Britain’s settlement model in 50 years, based on contribution, integration and respect for our laws.’