How Unsettled is EU Status?
The Briefing Room
BBC
4.8 • 731 Ratings
🗓️ 1 July 2021
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
European Union and European Economic Area citizens living in the UK should have applied for so-called settled status in Britain before July 1st. Over five million people have applied - a significantly higher figure than the British government originally estimated would be eligible. But there are fears that, for various reasons, tens of thousands of people failed to meet the deadline. In theory, this means they could lose their right to work, rent housing, or access certain hospital treatment, and are potentially subject to removal from the country. UK citizens living in EU countries are also having to prove their status. To examine what has happened so far - to EU citizens in the UK and to UK citizens in the EU - and what happens next, David Aaronovitch is joined in the Briefing Room by:
Mark Easton, the BBC's Home Affairs Editor Michaela Benson, Professor of Sociology at the University of Lancaster Catherine Barnard, Professor of European Union and Labour Law, Cambridge University. Jill Rutter, former Treasury official and senior fellow at the Institute for Government.
Producers: John Murphy, Ben Carter, Kirsteen Knight Editor: Jasper Corbett
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:06.1 | Welcome to the briefing room with me, David Oronovich. The briefing room is the virtual space where the top experts get to explain to you and me one of the big issues of the day. |
| 0:16.4 | Inside this week's 28 minutes, millions of UK citizens live in the EU, and millions of EU citizens |
| 0:22.7 | live in the UK. Now that freedom of movement has ended, what's happening to all those people? |
| 0:37.4 | Back in 2016, a major Brexit promise was that the UK would take back control of its borders and immigration. |
| 0:45.7 | That meant ending the European Union's policy of freedom of movement. |
| 0:50.0 | But that left the question of what would happen to the millions of British people who live in EU countries |
| 0:55.1 | and the millions of EU citizens who live here. |
| 0:58.6 | The UK government drew up something called the EU settlement scheme |
| 1:02.4 | and the deadline for European Union citizens living here to sign up to it has just passed. |
| 1:08.1 | So, what is it? And is it working? Step into the briefing room and let's find out. |
| 1:18.7 | First, let's settle some facts about settlement. Joining me in the briefing room is the BBC's |
| 1:23.9 | home editor, Mark Easton. Mark Eastern, why do we have an EU settlement scheme? |
| 1:30.3 | Well, of course, after Brexit, a decision needed to be made about what to do with the millions of |
| 1:35.1 | EU and indeed European economic area, EEA citizens and those from Switzerland, who were living |
| 1:42.3 | in the UK, the end of free movement and their right to live in |
| 1:46.3 | Britain, came to an end with the end of the Brexit transition on December the 31st last year. |
| 1:51.9 | Now, the government was aware of this issue and needed to put something in place, and a couple |
| 1:55.5 | of years ago, they introduced the European Union settled statuseme. And what that does essentially is say that |
| 2:03.4 | if you were resident in the UK before that date of December the 31st, the end of the Brexit |
| 2:08.7 | transition, then you can apply for settled status, which would give you indefinite leave to remain. |
| 2:16.8 | And indeed, that scheme scheme the ministers would say, |
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