Friday

29th Mar 2024

May defends proposal on EU citizens' rights

  • May (r) said British people voted to “take back control of our laws, our money and our borders" (Photo: UK Parliament/flickr)

Britain has said EU nationals and their relatives can apply for “settled status” after Brexit, but the EU said the offer lacked “ambition, clarity”.

British prime minister Theresa May told parliament on Monday (26 June) that the arrangements would give “reassurance and certainty” to the 3.2 million EU citizens who lived in the UK.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Get the EU news that really matters

Instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

  • Barnier (r) has said the EU court should be able to protect EU nationals' rights (Photo: European Commission)

“We want you to stay”, she said.

“No families will be split up,” she added.

She said British people, in last year’s referendum, voted to “take back control of our laws, our money and our borders, to restore supremacy to this parliament”, but not to “turn our backs on our friends and neighbours” in the EU.

The UK the same day published details of its “settled status” offer.

EU nationals who get settled status would have the same rights as British citizens except the right to vote, the offer said.

All 3.2 million would have to apply for it online in a “streamlined digital process” with fees to be set “at a reasonable level”.

Eligibility

They would be eligible if they had lived in the UK for five years or more prior to a cut-off date which remained to be agreed.

But they would be subject to “an assessment of conduct and criminality, including not being considered a threat to the UK”.

They would also lose their settled status if they were in future “absent from the UK for more than two years, unless they have strong ties here.”

Their relatives could stay or come over from the EU if they “have been in a genuine relationship with an eligible EU citizen while resident in the UK”.

But if they married a non-UK citizen in future, their wives or husbands would have to meet a minimum income threshold in order to join them.

Meanwhile, those who moved to Britain more recently than five years ago could apply for “temporary status” before they got their “settled” rights.

There would also be a two-year “grace period” for late applications so that there would be, in May’s words, “no cliff edge” in people’s lives.

The British document ruled out any role for EU courts, an earlier EU demand.

“The arrangements … will be enshrined in UK law and enforceable through the UK judicial system, up to and including the Supreme Court”, it said.

In other details, it said the UK would recognise EU nationals’ pre-Brexit professional qualifications.

It also said EU students in British universities could complete their courses, but did not say if they would have the right to subsequently work in the UK.

EU reaction

Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, said on Twitter on Monday that there was “More ambition, clarity and guarantees needed than in today’s UK position.”

Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s Brexit negotiator, said “a number of limitations remain worrisome and will have to be carefully assessed.”

Her added that “any degradation of the rights linked to freedom of movement” would be “contrary to union law”.

May’s handling of the EU negotiation also prompted rebuke in the British parliament, where Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the opposition Labour Party, said she had used EU citizens’ rights as “bargaining chips”.

“Can the prime minister now confirm what will happen to her offer to nationals in this country if no deal is reached [with the EU]?”, he asked.

He said her political mandate in the UK was “in tatters” after she lost her parliamentary majority in elections earlier this month.

He also said British voters had “rejected in large numbers” her threat to to turn the UK into “an offshore tax haven aimed at undercutting the European Union by ripping up regulation, hacking back public services”.

May's tactics

May replied to Corbyn by saying that she had to play hard-ball in the EU talks.

“I worry about those who appear to suggest in Europe that we should be punished in some sense for leaving”, she said.

She said Corbyn was among those “who say we should take any deal, regardless of the bill and regardless of the circumstances”.

May, who earlier on Monday secured the backing of the DUP, a Northern Irish unionist party, to stay in power, defended the idea of excluding the EU court from oversight.

She said the EU’s proposal amounted to saying there would be “two classes of citizens” in the UK - “UK citizens, whose rights would be guaranteed by the UK courts; and EU citizens, whose rights would be guaranteed by the European Court of Justice”.

“Our courts are world-renowned - they are respected around the world”, she said.

UK visitors to pay into EU budget after Brexit

The EU Commission says extra revenue generated from a new visa-free travel scheme, to launch in 2020, would go to the EU budget, reducing member state contributions.

British firms will 'beg' for EU court

Koen Lenaerts, the president of the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, said British firms will want the court to enforce their rights post-Brexit.

Brexit Briefing

Taking back control at home, not from EU

A year after British voters chose to leave the EU, "taking back control" from the bloc is firmly on the back-burner, as May government’s main ambition is its immediate survival.

Infographic

Citizens' rights: where EU and UK differ

The rights of 3.5 million EU citizens living in the UK and 1.2 million UK nationals living in EU countries is one of the key issues of the Brexit talks.

Opinion

Why UK-EU defence and security deal may be difficult

Rather than assuming a pro-European Labour government in London will automatically open doors in Brussels, the Labour party needs to consider what it may be able to offer to incentivise EU leaders to factor the UK into their defence thinking.

Latest News

  1. Kenyan traders react angrily to proposed EU clothes ban
  2. Lawyer suing Frontex takes aim at 'antagonistic' judges
  3. Orban's Fidesz faces low-polling jitters ahead of EU election
  4. German bank freezes account of Jewish peace group
  5. EU Modernisation Fund: an open door for fossil gas in Romania
  6. 'Swiftly dial back' interest rates, ECB told
  7. Moscow's terror attack, security and Gaza
  8. Why UK-EU defence and security deal may be difficult

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Nordic Council of MinistersJoin the Nordic Food Systems Takeover at COP28
  2. Nordic Council of MinistersHow women and men are affected differently by climate policy
  3. Nordic Council of MinistersArtist Jessie Kleemann at Nordic pavilion during UN climate summit COP28
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersCOP28: Gathering Nordic and global experts to put food and health on the agenda
  5. Friedrich Naumann FoundationPoems of Liberty – Call for Submission “Human Rights in Inhume War”: 250€ honorary fee for selected poems
  6. World BankWorld Bank report: How to create a future where the rewards of technology benefit all levels of society?

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsThis autumn Europalia arts festival is all about GEORGIA!
  2. UNOPSFostering health system resilience in fragile and conflict-affected countries
  3. European Citizen's InitiativeThe European Commission launches the ‘ImagineEU’ competition for secondary school students in the EU.
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersThe Nordic Region is stepping up its efforts to reduce food waste
  5. UNOPSUNOPS begins works under EU-funded project to repair schools in Ukraine
  6. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsGeorgia effectively prevents sanctions evasion against Russia – confirm EU, UK, USA

Join EUobserver

EU news that matters

Join us