Michaela Benson considers why it is timely to consider the longer-term impact of Brexit for British citizens living in the EU, EEA and EFTA member states.
For the 1.2 million British citizens living in the EU, EEA and EFTA (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland), Brexit led to changes to their status and rights. We are now approaching five years since the end of the Brexit transition period. That means many British citizens in the EU who were beneficiaries of the Withdrawal Agreement, will be transitioning from temporary to permanent residence.
As part of this transition, some British citizens will have to apply for new documentation. There are concerns that people may be refused or denied residence permits, particularly if they are unable to demonstrate continuous residence as per the terms laid out in the Withdrawal Agreement. It is unclear to what extent issues that emerge as part of this transition will be recorded, or what support will be offered.
This is part of a bigger problem. In contrast to EU nationals in the UK, we know relatively little about how British citizens in the EU have been faring since the end of the Brexit transition period. This reflects a longer-term imbalance where the vast majority of research, knowledge and understanding of the impacts of Brexit has focussed on EU nationals in the UK.
The Withdrawal Agreement allows for each country to independently implement and administer the provisions for British citizens who had been living in its territory before 31 December 2020. The significant differences in how members states approach registration requirements for EU citizens – which range from non-mandatory (e.g. France) to mandatory registration to local authorities in order to access employment, housing or healthcare (e.g. Germany) – were echoed in the different approaches they adopted towards British citizens. Some states have operated a declaratory system – where those who were lawfully resident as EU citizens were automatically granted post-Brexit status – and others a constitutive system – which required that people apply for a new status. Yet, even where countries shared an approach, the administrative processes have been somewhat different, with, for example, administration conducted at different scales of the state from local to national. The implementation of citizens’ rights for British citizens in the EU therefore entailed 27 slightly different administrative processes (and if you add the EEA and EFTA countries, this rises to 31).
This has made understanding any issues emerging for British citizens far more complicated than in the case of EU citizens in the UK who share a common application process. While the EU and UK offered country-level advice for how people could secure their status, the limited academic research demonstrated that many British citizens living in the EU were unsure of what they needed to do to secure their rights or how Brexit had changed these. This was not helped by delays by some countries in issuing guidance for what people needed to do to secure their post-Brexit status.
At an early stage, it was clear that there would be those who were prone to falling between the gaps in the provisions. Of particular concern were those who could not advocate for themselves for a variety of reasons from serious health problems and mental incapacity through to British children who had been taken into care. In these cases, the risks included not having access to adequate documentation, lack of knowledge or support with completing necessary paperwork or applications. The case of Kathleen Poole, an elderly British woman with Alzheimer’s living in a care home in Sweden, who was threatened with deportation, drives home how the most marginal and vulnerable might find themselves falling foul of new requirements.
There were also cases of administrative injustice. For example, in the early stages of implementation in France, the English-language newspaper The Connexion reported on a handful of cases where British citizens were found not to be lawfully resident. This was often after they had lived and worked in France for many years. Yet, at the time of application, they lacked sufficient resources to support themselves, due to chronic ill health which had restricted their ability to continue working, or recent changes to personal circumstances, such as the death of a partner and resultant changes to income.
Even in cases where the implementation of citizens’ right had gone smoothly, related administrative processes at times generated issues. For example, despite an overall smooth implementation of citizens’ rights in Portugal, delays to the issuing of biometric residence cards led to British citizens’ finding themselves grounded without being able to prove their status.
While campaign groups and the media raised public awareness about these issues through the implementation period, following the end of the Brexit transition period public coverage has waned.
As we approach five years since the end of the Brexit transition period, research focussed on the experience of the British beneficiaries of the Withdrawal Agreement has declined. While the work of campaign groups such as British in Europe has continued, they are doing so with far less resource and political opportunity than before. British citizens living in the EU have also raised concerns about the lack of an equivalent to the Independent Monitoring Authority – which monitors the implementation of citizens’ rights for EU nationals in the UK.
Indeed, there are outstanding issues relating to the implementation that give some immediate insights into the longer tail of Brexit for Britons resident in the EU. Just as for EU nationals living in the UK, these include late applications, refusals and appeals. These are often cases that raise questions of administrative injustice, but which also demonstrate the uneven outcome of Brexit within the population of Britons living in the EU.
There are also unanswered questions about these Britons’ experiences of proving and having their status recognised by employers, landlords and street level bureaucrats, as well as exercising their rights as laid out in the Withdrawal Agreement. Addressing this through systematic research at this stage, will bring our knowledge and understanding in line with that of EU nationals living in the UK.
By Michaela Benson, Professor of Public Sociology, Lancaster University.
To take part or share Michaela’s survey on this topic, visit Citizens’ rights and British Citizens in the EU, EEA and EFTA, five years on from Brexit. The survey remains open until 11 July 2025.