EU makes offer and tells UK to ‘get on with it’
With political turmoil in the UK after the election, Brexit talks were still expected to get under way on going to press – eventually.
Three months have already been lost since the article 50 trigger and European Council president Donald Tusk says time is short if a deal is to be agreed, debated by EU and UK parliaments and signed off before March 29, 2019, the expected ‘Brexit Day’.
“We don’t know when Brexit talks start. We know when they must end. Do your best to avoid a ‘no deal’ as result of ‘no negotiations’,” he tweeted.
The EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier told journalists: “Time is passing quicker than anyone believes... I can’t negotiate with myself.”
President Macron has told UK Prime Minister Theresa May “the door is open” to the UK remaining in the EU, however he said it would become progressively harder as the talks process continues.
The EU has promised ‘maximum transparency’ during negotiations and is putting key documents on a website at: https://goo.gl/0L9LGu. Among these are ‘negotiation directives’, which say they wish to guarantee all key rights of Britons in the EU27 and EU27 citizens in Britain for life, including for family members who join them.
They say these rights should be those enjoyed at the exit date and ones people will only benefit from later, such as ones related to pensions, as well as ones in the process of being obtained. That means a Briton resident in France for two years at Brexit Day should maintain a ‘permanent residence’ right once they have been there for five.
Areas protected should include residence and rights of free movement as under the EU treaties, including ‘permanent residence’ after five years and rights to access healthcare; rights obtained under social security coordination including exportable benefits and pension aggregation; rights such as access to the labour market or to run a business, social charge or tax advantages and access to training; and rights of workers’ family members to education and training.
Continuing recognition of qualifications that were recognised at the withdrawal date should also be maintained, the EU says.
The EU asks that the European Commission retain a monitoring role on expat rights and the ECJ be able to enforce them.
Expat groups British in Europe and The 3million have written to UK party leaders and MPs urging them to reciprocate, to reach an early agreement and to ‘ring-fence’ expat rights from other matters so even if these fail the expat deal stands.
The chair of the British in Europe coalition, Jane Golding, said: “The EU has made a generous, unilateral offer to UK citizens in the EU and is prepared to guarantee the vast majority of our rights. Now the election is over, we need urgently to know the UK’s response so we can see an end to the uncertainty facing thousands of families.”
She said BiE is writing to MPs and the prime minister asking for a clear response. She added BiE had held an “encouraging” meeting with the German foreign ministry which sees rights of Britons in Germany as “just as important as those of Germans in the UK”.
