February 26, 2026 Team Contibutor
As the UK travel rules 2026 came into effect, many Canadians with dual citizenship are left confused and frustrated. The passport that has taken them across the world without question can no longer get them through a checkpoint. Until now, a dual national could easily enter the UK with just a Canadian passport. After 25th Feb’26, it holds no value, especially in the UK context. You will be asked to produce a valid UK passport or a certificate of entitlement linked to your Canadian passport.
The new rules enforce a “no permission, no travel” policy. Responsibility for immigration checks has largely shifted to the departure gates in Ontario. Canadian-UK dual citizens are rethinking their family functions, reshuffling upcoming travel plans, while others are scrambling to get a UK passport.
What is an ETA — And why it changes everything
On the face of it, the UK ETA for Canadians look simple. It requires visitors from visa-exempt nations (85 different countries, including the US, Canada and EU) to carry an ETA (electronic travel authorisation) when travelling to the UK. British and Irish citizens don’t need an ETA.
The UK ETA, much like a similar system in Canada, can be seen as a digital permission to travel to the UK. It allows you to stay for 6 months at a stretch. You can make multiple visits on the same ETA. It’s not the VISA; it’s valid for 2 years or until your passport expires, whichever comes first.
The ETA costs £16 per person, including infants, and the price may rise to £20 in the coming weeks. It also applies to transiting passengers who pass through UK border control. The UK government says it typically takes a few minutes to obtain an ETA.
Britain’s quiet border ambitions
The new changes are part of the U.K.’s rollout of its Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) system, which aims to tighten border security by pre-screening visa-exempt travellers. It is similar to the ESTA system in the US and the upcoming ETIAS in the EU. The improved system will filter out suspicious individuals, streamline operations, and de-risk threats through robust prechecks.
Prime facie, it appears to be a positive step towards streamlining immigration. However, if you scratch the surface, it becomes evident that the UK entry process will become complex and winding for dual Canadian-British citizens.
Complicating the UK entry process for dual Canadian-British citizens
Canada-UK dual nationals have slammed the move as ridiculous and logic-defying. The problem isn’t for purely Canadian citizens who would just need an ETA going forward (takes minutes), or for Canadians who also have a valid UK passport.
The real challenge is for a large group of Canadians holding British citizenship. They never bothered to get a UK passport because the system didn’t require one. And now, with the new rules mandating it, they are left thinking about how to get one.
Even going by conservative estimates as of early 2026, the estimated number of Canadians who also hold British citizenship is between 135,000 and 160,000, mostly concentrated in Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta. That’s a sizeable number.
What does the new rule say about Canadian-UK nationals or dual citizens?
Under the new UK entry rules for dual citizens, their Canadian passport wouldn’t allow them to enter the UK. Since the system would cross-reference and recognise their British citizenship, the “ETA not applicable” clause kicks in. The ETA application will be rejected then and there.
The only route left to them is to have a UK passport at that point or carry a “Right of Abode” (Certificate of Entitlement). The document would certify the airlines of the travellers’ British status and would still allow them to travel on their Canadian passport. Obtaining any of these documents may consume weeks.
It is also estimated that the Certificate of Entitlement UK cost is roughly £589 (~$1,030 CAD), which is surprisingly more than the cost of a new UK passport, estimated at £131.01 (~$229 CAD). Even renouncing UK citizenship comes at a substantial cost (approx $845 CAD). These are real pain points.
The rules also impact a life-long UK citizen who has a Canadian citizenship or second nationality but never felt the need to have a UK passport.
The onus of denying travel now rests with the airline. Carriers are now legally required to deny boarding to dual nationals travelling on a Canadian passport without these specific documents. Airlines in Toronto, Vancouver, or Montreal are legally required to verify a digital “permission to travel” before you board.
“I never needed to show anything except my Canadian passport”
Consider the case of 65-year-old Daniel Whitmore, a UK-born businessman from Toronto. He frequently visits his octogenarian parents, who still live in Richmond. There’s a grand family get-together planned in April this year. There’s perceptible frustration in his voice when he says his UK passport just expired last month, and that he never needed to show anything except his Canadian passport.
He’s not alone. There are hundreds of such cases coming up across social media, public forums where people are sharing personal stories of nostalgia and visible frustration.
What options do such dual citizens have? Let’s look into it.
UK entry requirements for dual citizens
1. Get a UK passport. Howsoever arduous, this is the common solution people are proposing across different conversations, now that pleas of “grace period” by groups have failed to make an impact. A valid British passport is the only way to get a “green light” from the airline’s digital check-in system.
2. Get a Certificate of Entitlement (Right of Abode)- It is a digital link (or a vignette in older cases) that tells the airline: “This Canadian passport holder has the right to enter the UK as a citizen.” These are now issued in a digital format, so you only apply once, and it links to your record.
3. The Home Office has issued temporary guidance allowing airlines to board passengers who present an expired British passport (issued after 1989) alongside a valid Canadian passport. But the catch is that your entry depends on the airline’s discretion. If the airline is strict, they can still refuse you boarding. We presume airports in Canada would like to play it safe.
The long drawn documentation process
Getting these documents isn’t easy. While it may take just a few minutes for UK ETA to be processed, Canadian dual citizens will have to wait weeks and shell out more than C$1,000 for the certificate of entitlement, which they can use with their Canadian passport.
And that’s not the only problem. UK passport applications from Canada are being rejected on flimsy grounds, such as photocopies of documents not being good enough or outright rejection of verifiers presented by the applicant.
Then there’s the now-infamous “one-name policy” in the UK. It mandates that the names in the British passport and the other passport be identical. Inconsistency in document names may lead to rejection.
Dig a little, and you will come across dozens of such unheard, undocumented cases of families and people caught off guard by a policy change that’s being seen as restrictive and discriminatory.
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