The European Parliament is set to
investigate the manner in which the British government is treating EU nationals
applying for UK citizenship.
A team is to look at situations
where EU nationals have confronted a "bureaucratic wall" when trying
to stay in the U.K. after Brexit, as reported by the Guardian.
Sophie in 't Veld, a Dutch
liberal MEP, stated that she wanted to frame the cross-party team after Theresa
May triggers Article 50 — which the British PM expects to do before the end of
March.
She said she will likewise ask
for that an agent of the British government — in a perfect world the head
administrator — go to Brussels to confront the Parliament's board of trustees
on civil freedoms, of which she is a part, and answer inquiries regarding EU
nationals who trust they have been dealt with unjustifiably since the Brexit
vote.
“We have been calling repeatedly
for Mrs. May to come before the European Parliament and I think she should come,
at the latest, once Article 50 has been triggered. We are going to put
questions to her on behalf of British and other EU citizens.
“Once Article 50 has been
triggered, and negotiations have started, I want to have a task force inside
the European Parliament that citizens can contact directly so that we can have
a clear idea of the difficulties people are facing and try to help. Brexit will
be partly a technical negotiation, but ultimately it is about people. The
consequence cannot be that millions of people are penalized.”
In 't Veld told the Guardian that
"people feel they are being harassed" and made a request to fill in excessive,
and some feel unnecessary, measures of printed material.
“Why is the British government
trying to make it so hard for people who have been living in the U.K. for
decades, who have set up a family there, work there? It is their home.
“What sort of signal are they
trying to send out to these people? I am not aware of U.K. nationals trying to
apply for citizenship elsewhere in the EU running into these kind bureaucratic
walls. I am not saying it doesn’t exist but I have not heard of it yet. I can
only suppose other countries are a bit more welcoming and facilitating.”
In her huge Brexit discourse last
week, May said she needed an arrangement on the eventual fate of British nationals
living in the EU and EU nationals in the U.K. at the earliest opportunity. In
any case, so far there is no such arrangement.
As indicated by the Guardian,
Home Office figures demonstrate a 50 percent expansion in the quantity of
candidates from EU nations looking for permanent British residency since the
Brexit vote in June. It ascended from 36,555 amongst April and June 2016 to
56,024 amongst July and September.
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