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Children born in Hong Kong to a Hong Kong permanent resident have their eligibility for permanent identity cards established at birth. But what if the child is born to a Hong Kong permanent resident not married to its mother and where the child was born outside of Hong Kong?

QUESTION

First, many thanks for your time.

I’m a permanent resident of Hong Kong and my son (now 2 years and 5 months) was born in Malaysia and has a Malaysian passport.

I applied for a dependency visa for him in 2012 and was granted a one-year visa in November of that year. He has spent 8 months in Hong Kong so far.

His mother is not a dependant (indeed I’m still married to another woman) but there is no conflict between us – we want what’s best for the child.

Is it correct to say that if I can get my son on the 3 x 3 dependant visa pattern he will be able in the end to apply for a permanent ID card?

ANSWER

A child of a Hong Kong resident can go on to secure a dependent visa sponsored by that resident on the basis that both parents agree that the child should be resident with one of the others if not both of them in Hong Kong.

So in a traditional family situation, this doesn’t present itself as a problem because both the parents and the child naturally together in Hong Kong. But in a scenario such as this where one parent is a permanent resident of Hong Kong and the other parent is not a resident of Hong Kong, but the couple have mutually decided that their offspring best interest would lie being resident with the permanent resident in Hong Kong.

As we’ve seen from this example, it is possible to secure a dependent visa for the child so that the child can live with its permanently resident parent in the HKR. And so once, they get the dependent visa typically it’s one year granted in the first instance and normally where both parents are in Hong Kong and both parents are permanent residents if the child itself isn’t a permanent resident because it wasn’t born in Hong Kong, then the dependent visa that’s issued goes on a three-year pattern and a three-year pattern, so that altogether in this instance you can anticipate that once the dependent visa has been held for a full seven years, issued for one year and then renewed twice at three years on each occasion, then you get a full seven years continuous residence status endorsed in the child’s passport all throughout this time and on the basis the child has been resident in Hong Kong, been educated and all the rest of that good stuff in that seven years, then you can make an application at the expiry of the second dependent visa period of stay for verification for eligibility for a permanent identity card for the child and at that point, if the child is verified as being eligible for the issuance of a permanent identity card once they become of age to procure one, that’s the 11^th birthday. So you get the juvenile ID card, then, the passport of the child is endorsed to the extent that the eligibility for that permanent identity card has been verified and so a label is placed in the back of the passport and that then dispenses with the need to have a formal dependent visa. And so the child is then allowed to exit and enter Hong Kong and live here unconditionally as though it was a permanent resident at that point in the game.

So once the child gets to eleven years of age and application is made for a juvenile identity card a cheque is made at the time of the application. Consideration as to whether the child has been continuously or nearly resident with his parents in Hong Kong, and as they are juveniles, invariably they have been. And on the basis that has been satisfied then the child will be issued a juvenile permanent identity card and then they are effective permanent residents of Hong Kong.

I hope this helps.

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