Rights of Europeans 'protected in UK after Brexit'
Expatriates’ rights are back in the news with reports that the UK will respect the rights of European Citizens living in Britain after Brexit, with or without a deal.
The comments came from The Telegraph, which said this will be confirmed on Thursday when the UK government is set to release some 80 papers about its contingency plans in the case of ‘no deal’.
The news has been welcomed on social media groups concerned with Brexit rights, and hardline Eurosceptic MP Jacob Rees-Mogg also said he agrees with it as it would be unfair to remove rights retrospectively.
However Conservative MP David Jones, a former Brexit Minister, said rights have to be reciprocal and the UK must “look after our own people”.
Connexion understands, however, that while reciprocity has been crucial to the Brexit negotiations, the residency rights of citizens of other European Union countries living in the UK are already protected in the event of ‘no deal’ because the UK government has now put a so-called ‘settled status’ for this group into domestic UK law.
As for Britons living in other EU states, their rights in the event of ‘no deal’ could vary state by state, however an Interior Ministry official recently reassured Connexion that they would respect the rights of those who are properly established here under EU rules, eg. having worked or been self-supporting in the first five years (full interview from August’s edition at this link, free to subscribers or otherwise paywall for 85%).
