The discussion of the changes was made in a working group of the parliamentary committee on Constitutional Affairs in recent months, coordinated by the former minister and PS deputy Constança Urbano de Sousa, who made an indicative vote and which is discussed in the committee, on Tuesday.

The agreed final text was based on two bills, from the People-Animals-Nature Party (PAN) and from the PCP, approved in general on 12 December 2019. The diploma of the Left Block (BE) was not accepted and the Joacine Katar Moreira's project, then at Livre, was unsuccessful.

In May, Constança Urbano de Sousa explained to Lusa that the proposal to reach consensus allows that "the children of legal immigrants - who have a residence permit or who have taken up residence for at least one year - who were born in Portugal can be Portuguese".

BE proposed that nationality should be given to children born in Portugal, even if the parents are foreigners and do not reside in the country.

The PCP, in its original project, proposed that Portuguese citizens "those born in Portugal, provided that one of their parents, being a foreigner, is resident in the country", regardless of title or length of residence.

The PS, which did not have its own project, presented proposals of change in the PCP diploma and proposed Portuguese nationality to children of foreigners since, "at the time of birth, one of the parents legally resides in Portuguese territory, or resides here, regardless of title, at least a year ago ".

Under current law, originally from 1981 and amended in 2018, that period is now two years, which the Socialists intend to reduce to one.

The reduction of this period was explained by the former minister in this way: "It is the temporal criterion used by the United Nations and the European Union to distinguish immigration from other movements of people or tourists, people on business visits or on short stays. "

Consensus also had the proposal by the non-registered deputy Joacine Katar Moreira (ex-Livre) and PAN to expand access to naturalization to people born in Portugal after April 25, 1974 and before the entry into force of the nationality law, in 1981.

It is a historical problem to solve the situation of people who, on April 25, 1974, were deprived of Portuguese nationality, by decree 308/75, for not living in Portugal for five years.

Some of them have been regularizing their situation, through various channels, such as marriage, but there are still an undetermined number of citizens in this situation.

On the right wing, PSD and CDS have already announced that they will vote against legal changes, claiming the Social Democrats that the country already has of the "most generous in Europe and with recent changes" legislation, while the centrists argue that the changes "devalue nationality" Portuguese "and the" blood connection to Portugal "criterion.

The left-wing parties voted, for the most part, for changes in the working group, for proposals to change the law, which indicates a majority vote.

In recent weeks, a debate has arisen over the possibility of “tightening” the rules for granting Portuguese nationality to descendants of Sephardic Jews, expelled in the 15th century, and which is granted almost automatically by a law unanimously approved in 2013 by the Assembly of the Republic.

First, the PS proposed that candidates for nationality should have at least two years of residence in the country, which led to criticism from historical socialist leaders and the Israeli community.

Then, in May, he withdrew the proposal, maintaining the more general reference to the requirement to connect candidates to Portugal. In July, he withdrew the second proposal, referring to the Government the regulation regarding the granting of nationality.