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Simon Willison’s Weblog

I guess I should hand in my passport

An example Britishness test based on proposals by the home office for a written test for immigrants applying for citizenship. I got 3 out of 10! (via Simon Brunning).

Posted 5th September 2003 at 8:55 pm

This is I guess I should hand in my passport by Simon Willison, posted on 5th September 2003.

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13 comments

  1. i got 6 of 10. that seems to me to be not bad for someone whose only time in the united kingdom has been spent at heathrow. (to be fair, i got most of them right through shrewd and lucky guessing, not any real knowledge.)

    jim winstead - 5th September 2003 21:32 - #

  2. nice solid 9 here, i'd wonder how I lost the other one, but I dont really put the queens actual birthday down as important information (although I do wonder where the heck I plucked the welsh assembly's leaders name out from, viva las guesswork)

    Gavin - 5th September 2003 23:38 - #

  3. 5 out of 10 here, I guess I'd better turn my passport in as well!

    Tim Fountain - 6th September 2003 00:13 - #

  4. Hmm... 8 out of 10. How the hell am I meant to know who the leader of the Welsh Assembly is? And as for that minimum wage question... well, it's a trick! The "correct" answer doesn't not answer the question posed.

    Q. The national minimum wage for workers aged 22 and over goes up this month from GBP 4.20 per hour to what?

    A. The new rate for workers aged 18-21 inclusive, is GBP 3.80 per hour.

    Now, how am I meant to get that from the options GBP 4.30, GBP 4.50 and GBP 5.00 per hour?

    Oh, and sorry for the use of GBP... apparently £ is not valid XHTML.

    Andrew - 6th September 2003 00:20 - #

  5. Oi, I got 5 out of 10. Not too bad considering I am Dutch! :-)

    Hans - 6th September 2003 03:40 - #

  6. The BBC does say "hypothetical questions" - I take that to mean they made them up.

    6 out of 10, but I shan't be turning my passport in on the BBC's say-so! It seems to me that they are, for the most part, fairly foolish questions anyway. "What's the new minimum wage?" for example, merely measures whether someone has looked at the news or not recently. And why should it make me British if I know nothing about Purcell or Elgar or Britten but do know which ephemeral pop group is which?

    Michael - 6th September 2003 09:24 - #

  7. 7 of 10. Not bad considering I'm from Russia and never been in UK :)

    Alexei - 6th September 2003 15:55 - #

  8. I got 5 out of 10, I dont see how that test acually proves you are British in the slightest! - I also notice from the comments that those from outside the UK actually do better :)

    Natalie - 7th September 2003 07:40 - #

  9. The British are lazy. :) We don't care who does what. We just want a good life.

    Damon Stephenson - 7th September 2003 13:34 - #

  10. The fact it's multi-choice also means someone can get a good score without actually knowing the answers :)

    Smiler - 7th September 2003 17:20 - #

  11. 3 out of 10 here as well. Does the fact I'm in Scotland count as an excuse? And quite why knowing the names of Teen Pop bands is a good test of britishness I don't know.

    Simon Proctor - 8th September 2003 12:20 - #

  12. 4 of 10, but only because:

    1. my sister's birthday is the same as the queen's
    2. I knew Cockney wouldn't be the official
    3. I had a good guess
    4. - twice.

    David Engel - 8th September 2003 20:48 - #

  13. Wow, I'm more British than you. And I'm an knuckle-dragging American. Scored a 4/10.

    Dast - 9th September 2003 01:56 - #

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