She was born in York, lives in York, and her father is a British citizen, but little Ella Maurer has been refused a British passport.

The decision, slammed as "outrageous" today by her parents, has now thrown into doubt a planned visit to her mum Karin's native Sweden, where four-month-old Ella was to meet her grandparents, aunts and uncles, for the first time.

The Passport Office turned down the application because Ella's engaged parents, Karin, and David Wiles, an Evening Press journalist, were not married when she was born.

"The whole family will be heartbroken if this bit of petty bureaucracy prevents us from getting together this summer," said Karin, 26, of Clifton, York.

"My daughter should be as entitled to a British passport as anyone else - what's the difference between her and the other babies born at York District Hospital at the same time?

"I may not be British, but I am an EU national. I have worked and paid taxes here for nine years and I can vote. Her dad is British, but Ella has no rights as a British citizen, despite having a British birth certificate.

"We are being penalised, just because we are not married. We live together like a married couple, but it's just that we haven't gone through the old-fashioned formalities of a wedding ceremony. It's outrageous."

It will take the family three months to get Ella a Swedish passport - which ironically she is entitled to, despite the fact she has never been there.

A spokeswoman for the Home Office said the rule was that if the parents were not married at the time of the birth and the mother was not a British national, the child did not qualify for a British passport.

Even if the parents got married after the birth, the child would still not qualify.

In such a case, the mother could apply for "leave to remain" as an EU national, and if she was granted this, the parents could then apply for the child to be "naturalised".

If this application was successful, the child would become a British citizen and would then qualify for a passport.

Updated: 10:50 Saturday, April 06, 2002