Life in the UK Test

The grounds for exemption of people under the age of 65 need to be compelling, such as where the applicant:

- is suffering from a long term illness or disability which severely restricts mobility and ability to attend language classes; or
- has a mental impairment which means that they are unable to learn another language.

Applicants claiming exemption must include in their naturalisation applications detailed reasons for doing so. This should include evidence from an appropriate medical practitioner of any physical or mental impairment that would prevent them from taking a test. They should be aware that test centres can cater for applicants with a range of disabilities, for example limited mobility and visual impairment.

However, the Home Office would consider exempting someone under the age of 65 on physical and mental grounds only very rarely. This would be in cases of long standing and permanent disability, rather than a mental or physical ailment that could respond to treatment or therapy. And the nature of the disability must be such as to prevent a person from learning English rather than requiring special arrangements to be made for learning it.

Between November 1, 2005 and March 1, 2006 - in 4 months, that is - 7,373 people failed.* It means that approximately 60 people failed the “Life in the UK Test” every day.

Why taking the risk? Take our “Real Test Simulations” to make sure you are ready. And remember, you can get a full refund if you fail. Which is very unlikely!

*House of Commons Hansard Written Answers for April 18, 2006 

Your test supervisor will let you know if you fail the test. You should not apply for naturalisation in this case.

You can take the test again, but it is recommended that you do not do it immediately. You should go back and study chapters 2, 3 and 4 of the ‘Life in the United Kingdom’ handbook and do practice tests on this website, until you feel confident. Your results notification letter will give you feedback on which areas of the handbook you need to look at again. You will then need to book a new test date and time with your test centre. Alternatively, if you feel you did not pass the test because of your level of English, you may like to consider attending combined English language (ESOL) and citizenship classes at your local further education college. You would do this instead of taking the test again.

TRICKY QUESTION of the Day:

How many public holidays are there in Britain?
If you search on the internet, you may find that there are as many as 8 public holidays.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_Holiday
http://www.dti.gov.uk/employment/bank-public-holidays/index.html
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2005/01/bankholidays

You will also find out that Scotland - part of Britain - does not consider Easter Monday a public holiday.

Nevertheless, page 53 of the official manual says:

“There are also FOUR public holidays a year, called Bank Holidays, when legislation requires banks and most businesses to close.”
This seems to be the “expected” answer.

Good Luck!

The TRICKY QUESTION of the Day is:

How many countries are there in the British Commonwealth?

Page 72 of the official “Life in the UK” manual says:

The Commonwealth has a membership of 54 states.

But the webpage of the Commonwealth Secretariat,
http://www.thecommonwealth.org/subhomepage/151236/
says differently:

The Commonwealth is an association of 53 independent states consulting and co-operating in the common interests of their peoples and in the promotion of international understanding and world peace.

The right answer is 53.

Zimbabwe left the Commonwealth in 2003. The authors of “Life in the UK” perhaps looked at some outdated data. This error will be most probably corrected in the new edition.

And remember: a country might be “suspended” from the Commonwealth (like Fiji is now), but it still remains a member.

More questions on the Commonwealth, European Union, Council of Europe, United Nations etc., are available in the “Practice Questions: UK and International Organisations: http://www.cititest.com/life-in-the-uk-test/downloads

Good Luck!

The TRICKY QUESTION of the Day is:

Who is the head of the Anglican Church?

You might get possible answers like:

The Queen
The Archbishop of Canterbury
The Head of State of the United Kingdom

etc.

“The Life in the UK” manual is not clear at all on the matter.

Here’s what it says:

“The Church of England, or Anglican Church as it is also known, came into existence in 1534. The King installed himself as head of the Church, and the title of the Supreme Governor has been held by the King or Queen ever since. /…/ The Queen or King also has the right to appoint a number of senior church officers, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is the head of the church. “

(Page 50).

The same paragraph mentiones both the King and the Archbishop of Canterbury as “head of the church”.

In fact, this position simply doesn’t exist.

According to the Bible, the head of the church is actually Jesus Christ:

http://scriptures.lds.org/en/tg/j/43

The Church never refers to the Archbishop of Canterbury as its “Head”; they prefer the title “spiritual leader”.

The official title of the Queen is “the Supreme Governor of the Church”.

But the Queen does not have the title “Head of State”, yet she is.

In fact, if you are asked, “WHo is the Head of State of the United Kingdom?” the only correct answer is “The Queen”.

So, what is the right answer?!

It is VERY likely that the authors of the test expect you to answer “Archbishop of Canterbury”.

Hopefully you will not get BOTH “the Queen” and “the Archbishop of Canterbury” as answer options!

THE TRICKY QUESTION of the day:

How many parliaments are there in Britain?

Write down your answer - just the number.

Now, answer the following questions, and also write down your answers.

How many local parliaments are there in the UK?

How many local parliaments are there in England?

How many parliaments are there in the UK?

Now check your answers. Your numbers should be, in this order:

3
3
0
4

Did you get it right?

Where’s the trick?!

If the question is about “parliaments”, don’t forget to include the Westminster - the actual parliament of the United Kingdom.

If the question is about “local parliaments”, there are only 3:

the parliament of Scotland
the Assembly of Wales
the parliament of Northern Ireland, also known as Stormont

The very first question used the word “Britain” instead of “UK”, therefore, you must exclude the parliament of Northern Ireland: Northern Ireland is not part of Britain.

The third question was about England. There is NO English parliament; there was one in the past, but only until 1707. (You don’t need to remember that). So, because we are asked only about LOCAL parliaments, the answer is zero. If it didn’t say “local”, we would have to answer “1″, because the UK Parliament is in London, which is in England!

Conclusion:

Read the questions carefully.

Avoid the situation where you know the material, but still give a wrong answer just because you missed a tiny detail in the question.

Remember: your knowledge of English is also being tested.

There are some questions on Parliaments in our Free Training and in the Evaluation Test.

Good luck!