Talk Quesada forum

I heard something on the news yesterday about Citizenship in Spain and wondered what the difference is between Citizenship and Residencia? I know that both mean you can live in Spain and I know the criteria is different. For instance Citizenship involves being able to demonstrate reasonable command of the Spanish language and knowledge of history and culture (as anyone wanting citizenship in the UK has to ) but why would anyone want citizenship as opposed to Residencia in Spain?

The reason I ask that question is that, apparently, in England a person can get dual citizenship (and hold both passports) but going by what I heard yesterday, if it was correct, Citizenship in Spain means that you have to give up the right to your 'home' country citizenship and only hold one passport (a Spanish one).

I know many Brits in Spain get Residencia but the news article yesterday was saying that there is a massive increase in Citizenship applications in Spain recently.

Just interested.


Jan

Apart from certain groups of people (mainly from S America) you can't get Spanish citizenship without giving up the citizenship of your own country. You get a Spanish passport, have all the rights to welfare, health etc if you take out Spanish citizenship and you have to swear an oath of allegiance to Spain.
Residency simply gives you the right to live in Spain and your healthcare and pensions, if appropriate, are still paid for by your home country and you keep your British passport.
The reason people are applying for citizenship is to ensure they retain their rights after UK leaves the EU, in much the same way as people with Irish ancestry applied for Irish citizenship (but you can have dual nationality with them).
To get ciitizenship you have to demonstrate a good knowledge of both spoken and written Spanish, show some history of integrating with the Spanish as in voluntary work and so on, and pass a written test about Spanish culture, history and so on. As an aside, I was reading somewhere that a UK national had failed the written test because he didn't know the name of the husband of the King's sister (La Infanta).

(Apparently it's Inaki Urdangarin, a former Olympic handball player and who has just started a 6 year sentence for tax fraud).

Interesting. Thanks marcliff.

If you want to give the nationality test a go, you can find a test one here: http://nacionalidadespanola.com/test-de-nacionalidad/
You get 45 minutes & have to get more than 15 correct.

Martin the artist wrote:If you want to give the nationality test a go, you can find a test one here: http://nacionalidadespanola.com/test-de-nacionalidad/
You get 45 minutes & have to get more than 15 correct.

Took the test and got 16 so I'm guaranteed to become a citizen! Lol

But it's in Spanish???

Yes the questions were in Spanish!

Thankyou Martin for putting the test on. I passed but afraid only got 16.

Great link....that was good fun, took the test and got 17 correct..!