Brexit: what would happen to EU citizens living in UK?

[marghini]

I am a EU citizen and I have been living, working and paying taxes in the UK for a while.

I am really concerned about what would happen to the EU citizens who built a life for themselves and settled here in the UK in case of a Brexit.

Do you think all EU citizens already living in the UK would be pushed out? Or perhaps the government would just stop allowing further EU immigration?

You're quite right Mistigri I didn't mean to divert the purpose of this thread. Can I just say though that you are really wanting your cake and eating it wanting Brits who have been abroad over 15 year and EU citizens living here to have a vote.

Olbers: Because they may not qualify for either visas or naturalisation..

Citizenship generally has preconditions including "regular" residence for a minimum period, and language skills. Of the British people I know in France, many would not pass the obligatory language test, and others would not qualify for permanent residence because they have not been economically active in France for the minimum five year period required under European law.

If visas become obligatory, as is certainly possible, this could be problematic for retired people. Typically for non-EU citizens it is necessary to show that you are either self-supporting, including having private health insurance, or working and paying into the ststem. But most retired people living in Europe have no healthcare rights at all in their host states - their access to healthcare is based on EU agreements and is paid for by the UK.

Sorry I haven't read the thread as I haven't time atm, will catch up later. Only I saw a question about this from the other angle the other day (what happens to expats in Europe) and saw this answer which might be helpful if no one else has already mentioned it
" Expats would also enjoy significant legal protections that would apply after Brexit. Many lawyers argue that British expats living elsewhere in the EU at the time of Brexit would have individual "acquired rights" under international law.

This is based on the Vienna Convention of 1969, which says that the termination of a treaty "does not affect any right, obligation or legal situation of the parties created through the execution of the treaty prior to its termination.” The House of Commons Library says that "withdrawing from a treaty releases the parties from any future obligations to each other, but does not affect any rights or obligations acquired under it before withdrawal."

In other words, Brits who have already exercised their right to live in EU states would keep that right after Brexit."

That was from a Telegraph article from earlier this month.

Sorry meant to say I assume it works both ways.

pixel unfortunately one of the features of the brexit debate is that one person comes up with a legally-dubious argument and it gets repeated all over the place with no fact-checking ...

All the serious legal opinions I've read seem to think that the vienna convention is largely irrelevant, eg this writer (a professor of EU law)
eulawanalysis.blogspot.fr/2014/05/what-happens-to-british-expatriates-if.html

Personally I prefer to get my law from legal experts.

This may be of interest to those intending to apply for residency cards.

www.freemovement.org.uk/waiting-times-for-eea-residence-applications/

Waiting time for a permanent resident's card last year was just over 4 months. No figures for 2016 yet and the article makes the point that processing times may have increased as people try to get their paperwork in order ahead of the referendum.

It's implied that you have to surrender your passport during the application process - does anyone have experience of this?

If you go out of the European Union, my family, my friends, my knowledge will never buy a single product manufactured or sold in your country.
Anne-Marie a french granny

I'm really worried about us leaving the EU because I've seen posts that Immigrants will be sent back and what upsets me the most is that, I'm British born and raised and my partner is Hungarian and most of my friends are Hungarian and they've been over here for some time for like 3 years. My partner has been here for 5 years worked every day, his brother has been here over 5 years working everyday also, all pay taxes, National Insurance, as my friends live on site at our work as our work has team accommodation, my partner and his brother doesn't, they rent a flat and pay bills like most immigrants here does. I'm really worried in case they get sent back, I won't know what I'll do with my self.they're lovely bunch of people I've grown up being bullied and having next to no friends and I finally manage to make friends to find out they could be sent back leaving me with no one again. I've tried doing re search about this but I can't find anything.

I'm sure we will be happy to return the favour APLOS.
An English Brexit supporter

There has been disappointingly little discussion recently of the likely ramifications of the referendum for those of is exercising our right of free movement, but the prospect of visas for all has unfortunately come a little closer.

Dominic Raab, justice minister and Leave supporter, has suggested that visas may be required for all visitors in order for the UK to control its borders. If this were to happen, it would also mean visas for all EU nationals living in the UK. And since visa requirements in the EU are always reciprocal that means those of us UK citizens abroad would also need to obtain visas in order to live and travel in Europe.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/apr/24/britons-may-need-visa-to-visit-europe-post-brexit-says-dominic-raab

And since visa requirements in the EU are always reciprocal that means those of us UK citizens abroad would also need to obtain visas in order to live and travel in Europe.

As you're talking about reciprocity it's only fair to point out that the EU is not 'Europe'.
There are many countries in Europe that are not in the EU.

UK citizens wishing to live and work in non-EU European countries already require visas, and many of these countries also require visas for tourists. I sometimes travel to european Russia, and applying off for visas is a headache, especially if you live outside the UK and are supposed to have your passport with you at all times.

I do agree with your general point that it can sometimes be helpful to distinguish the 28 EU plus 4 EFTA countries from other european countries :)

As others have rightly said here in case of the UK exit its citizens living in the EU who are estimated to be around 1.2m would also be affected.

As the EU has confirmed the free movement right is one of those core values and thus non negotiable. It would be inconceivable therefore for EU citizens to continue exercising this right in case of the UK exit. This would of course also apply to the UK citizens living in the other 27 EU members states.

There perhaps would be a prolonged period of uncertainty while exit negotiations are taking place. This would certainly affect the British economy as no signifcant investment decision can be made until the situation is settled. We would likely suffer from a downturn as far as the economy is concerned.

As with everything else in the life here will also be a trade off. Britain would lose its access to the EU single market despite the fact that more than 40% of its overall trade is with the EU. But it will be able to bar EU citizens from working and living in the country without having a point based residence permit.

At the same time the EU can take tit for tat measures against the Brits living there. They can also levy import tariffs, quotas and possibly other non taiff barriers on imports from the UK. The latter may remain in one form or another even in case of securing a free trade agreement.

We should remember that the future of the UK- EU relationship would be subject to difficult lengthy negotiations. Those negotiations disregarding their outcome will take years to finalise and ratified.

I don't think if this would ultimately be a win-win situation and rather a lose-lose one for both the UK and the EU.

When the UK leaves the EU it will be a sovereign country that can decide to invite whoever it wants to come and live and work in the UK. It can invite people from around the world. It can decide that EU citizens are perfectly welcome to continue to come to the UK to fill skills shortages.

As we will no longer be part of the EU we would lose an automatic right to live in another country that does not want us there. If our people do have the skills that other countries want then those countries will continue to invite them to come and live and work in their countries.

Countries like Spain that have many hundreds of thousands of British pensioners living in their country have to decide whether they want those people to remain to come to their country to spend their money on Spanish retirement villas and other property and to use their money to stimulate the local Spanish economy or]whether Spain would prefer to see ghost towns all along it's coastline should it decide that British pensioners are no longer welcome to come and live in their country.

These are the decisions that free countries make for themselves, based on the needs of their country.

They are also bound by international law that prevents them summarily expelling any section of their population and also by Human Rights law that prohibits them from denying a person the peaceful enjoyment of their property,

So concerns that people who are living in other countries are going to be told to leave those countries is pure fear-mongering.

They are also bound by international law

International law can't be relied upon because it applies between two states rather than a state & an international institution.

Still waiting for the doom-sayers to tell me which part of their population the UK expelled in the last hundred years?

The UK regularly expels immigrants that it deems to have outstayed their welcome - including those who arrived as legal migrants. Non-EU immigrants now face being removed if they don't pass certain income hurdles.

While it's perfectly possible that EU migrants will be able to stay post-Brexit, this would require the negotiation of specific agreements and the enactment of new immigration legislation. There would need to be structures in place to allow the authorities and border police to distinguish between EU citizens with residence rights and those without.

At present, none of this exists - so it's ridiculous to say that all EU citizens will be allowed to stay, any more than it makes sense to suggest that they'll all have to leave. I'd bet on somewhere between the two (let's just say that if I were unemployed or had an eastern european passport I'd be making contingency plans) - but of course we won't know until or unless it happens.

At present, none of this exists

And that's where the problem lies.

The UK has no system for checking everyone who comes in - just checks against watch lists nor checking that people leave. The Home Office has resisted collating that data because it would probably highlight the scale of the migration problem.

However, post-Brexit, once you have introduced a points-based migration system you will definitely need IT systems to administer that new policy and that brings additional benefits in being able to better identify immigrants and refuse entry to those who we do not wish to have here. We will also gain the ability to deport EU criminals at the end of their prison term - something the EU's ECJ has prevented us from doing.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/12140444/European-court-challenges-Britains-right-to-deport-foreign-criminals.html

And remember - the ECJ is the body that ensures compliance with the EU Treaties. It's not the European Court of Human Rights - no, that is a different court.

So we have a court that was established to oversee trade deals ruling on whether we can deport EU criminals. And the power of the ECJ is increasing as they grab more power for themselves. And their power is supreme over the UK's own top court.

Anyway

Still waiting for the doom-sayers to tell me which part of their population the UK expelled in the last hundred years?

Illegal immigrants and visa-stayers are individual cases and every country in the world expels them - I am still waiting to hear about these mass expulsions that the UK has undertaken.

No one has made any claims about mass expulsions except you, springing.

no system for checking everyone who comes in - just checks against watch lists nor checking that people leave. The Home Office has resisted collating that data because it would probably highlight the scale of the migration problem

You are conflating immigration and border controls here - not all arrivals in the Uk are immigrants; most are tourists or business visitors. Controlling EU arrivals in the way you suggest would require visas for all visitors, which would be hugely disruptive for business and tourism.

Dominic Raab has suggested that visas for EU citizens are on the agenda and indeed it's hard to see how border security can be greatly improved without some system of checks before travel.

Obviously this isn't good news for EU migrants and suggests that we may have more cause for concern than we previously thought. It's useful to have confirmation of Leave camp thinking on this point I suppose :(

No one has made any claims about mass expulsions except you, springing.
You suggested that the EU would expel all EU migrants if there was a Brexit. Expelling a specific group of your popuation is 'a mass expulsion'
You have still not given me an example of these mass expulsions that your fear Britainis about to repeat..

no system for checking everyone who comes in - just checks against watch lists nor checking that people leave. The Home Office has resisted collating that data because it would probably highlight the scale of the migration problem

You are conflating immigration and border controls here - not all arrivals in the Uk are immigrants; most are tourists or business visitors.

I'm not conflating anything. I was told that we control our borders because we have passport control. That is very disingenuous as we all now that controlling borders is much more than that - it's deciding who comes here to visit, for how long, who comes here to live etc. Controlling borders is not flashing your passport at Heathrow.

Controlling EU arrivals in the way you suggest would require visas for all visitors, which would be hugely disruptive for business and tourism.

I'm not limiting it to EU arrivals, Everyone should be 'controlled' on entry 9and exit). That should be part of our basic security precautions - knowing who is in our country and who has left. Most of the rest of the wolrd operates that system. It prevents terrorists from swanning across 11 European borders on their way from ISI HQ to western Europe.

Dominic Raab has suggested that visas for EU citizens are on the agenda and indeed it's hard to see how border security can be greatly improved without some system of checks before travel.

Lol. There are already systems that check before travel when you arrive at airports you cannot just pitch up and sit on a UK bound plane because if that airline carries you illegally it will be fined. It would be quite easy to link an electronic visa system to an effective border system (something we do not currently have) - IF visas are needed which is complete fantasy anyway.

Obviously this isn't good news for EU migrants and suggests that we may have more cause for concern than we previously thought. It's useful to have confirmation of Leave camp thinking on this point I suppose

The 'LEAVE camp' wants a UK that controls its borders, can decide who to invite from throughout the world to come and live in the Uk and share their skills with us, and the ability to deport foreign criminals.

If tat inconveniences the world - tough. It's worth it to inconvenience terrorists.

You suggested that the EU would expel all EU migrants if there was a Brexit.

This is quite simply a lie.

This is a thread about what happens to EU migrants after a Brexit. You have repeatedly stated that EU migrants have nothing to worry about, based on no legal knowledge or analysis whatsoever.

I have said that EU migrants may have nothing to worry about, assuming that the UK signs up to EFTA (or negotiates a different agreement covering EU migrants).

In the absence of any such agreement, their futures will depend on whether the government enacts changes to national immigration law enabling them to stay. That begs the question of what criteria will be used to determine whether someone is allowed to remain, and what happens if they do not meet the criteria.

Mass deportations are highly unlikely, if only on cost grounds - the cost of removing 3 million EU passport holders would run into billions. But that's not much comfort for individuals who may find they are no longer welcome.