You can rebrand something as a territory or a dependency (or a DOM-TOM in the French case) but they're still the same. Even during the height of colonialism many of these places had some self-government and even democracy (Hong Kong). That was partly a practical consideration as many of them were so far away they had to run themselves to some extent.

But not all of Britain's colonies are far away.

The people living there might struggle to identify the difference?

Are you calling them stupid?

Mauritius and La Réunion are doing much better than say Madagascar.