The number of British nationals applying for Dutch nationality continues to rise, with over 1,300 taking the plunge last year, according to BNR radio.

And in the first six months of this year alone, 180 people opted to renounce their British nationality to become Dutch, compared to 280 in 2018 as a whole, figures from the IND immigration service show. Before Brexit, just a handful of people took such a step.

A further 1,060 people applied to become Dutch under the option ruling last year – which is open to people with a Dutch partner, pensioners and children who have gone through the complete Dutch school system.

Meanwhile, the government has still not published draft legislation to modernise Dutch rules on dual nationality, which were originally promised in the first quarter of 2019.

The government pledged in its 2017 coalition agreement to take steps to change the restrictive Dutch laws on nationality. In order to become Dutch, most people have to renounce their original nationality and Dutch nationals who take another nationality also lose their Dutch passports.

Rights

Research by this website last October showed that just 10% of British nationals had applied for Dutch nationality and that the rules on having two passports are a major stumbling block.

Asked why they had not done so, 41% said they did not want to give up their British passport. A further 14% said they were worried that becoming Dutch would affect their right to return to Britain for a longer period and 20% had not lived in the Netherlands long enough to qualify.

Some 86,000 people with British nationality currently live in the Netherlands, of whom 47,000 are first generation migrants, according to figures from the national statistics office CBS.