Unlock Democracy: Backwards step for UK citizenship

Lord Goldsmith's review of citizenship has been described as reflecting "Ikea nationalism", Unlock Democracy says.

The campaign group is especially critical of the proposed removal of voting rights for Commonwealth and Irish citizens and its lack of emphasis on active, "participative" citizenship.

"He isn't really championing citizenship at all but rather the notion that we should all be regarded as subjects of the crown," director Peter Facey said.

"There is certainly an argument that we should expect reciprocal arrangements with other Commonwealth states, but to pull up the drawbridge in the way that [Lord] Goldsmith suggests is not only negative and defensive but dismissive of our past."