{"id":770907,"date":"2026-02-17T17:49:16","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T17:49:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/770907\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T17:49:16","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T17:49:16","slug":"gibraltar-to-regain-freedom-of-movement-within-days-in-post-brexit-legal-tidy-up-euobserver","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/770907\/","title":{"rendered":"Gibraltar to regain freedom of movement within days, in post-Brexit legal tidy-up \u2013 EUobserver"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gibraltar will finally obtain free movement\u00a0into Spain\u00a0within the coming days,\u00a0after\u00a0the European Commission\u00a0confirmed it had published the draft law\u00a0that will govern the UK territory.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In a statement on Tuesday<\/a> (17 February), the EU Commission\u00a0said that it had\u00a0finalised\u00a0the\u00a0legal\u00a0text of\u00a0an agreement between EU and UK officials last December. It added that the agreement would be provisionally applied after being\u00a0signed off\u00a0by EU ministers\u00a0, pending approval\u00a0by the European Parliament.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With the formal sign off likely to be a formality that\u00a0brings to a close\u00a0one of the lengthiest\u00a0sagas of the Brexit process\u00a0over the legal status of Gibraltar, a self-governing British overseas territory which sits at the southern-most tip of Spain, that brought up long-standing tensions between the UK and Spain about Gibraltar\u2019s sovereignty.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Gibraltar\u00a0was unique among the\u00a0British overseas territories\u00a0in having its citizens casting a vote in the 2016 referendum.<\/p>\n

Though the UK as a whole voted by a 51.6-48.4 percent margin to leave the bloc,\u00a096 percent of\u00a0Gibraltarians voted \u2018Remain\u2019. <\/p>\n

Its\u00a0status was\u00a0then further\u00a0complicated by the decision by the Theresa May and Boris Johnson governments to end free movement by taking the UK out of the single market.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The rapid turnover of governments in the UK, meanwhile, further delayed trilateral talks between Spain, the\u00a0EU\u00a0and the UK.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Map locating Gibraltar (Source: Planiglobe\/Wikimedia<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Under the\u00a0deal<\/a>, all checks at the crossing point between Gibraltar and La Linea\u00a0in Spain\u00a0will be scrapped for the estimated 15,000 people who travel across in both directions every day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But the agreement also removes all physical barriers, checks and controls on goods circulating between Spain and Gibraltar. <\/p>\n

That means that Gibraltar, which is\u00a0not covered by the 2020 Trade and Cooperation Agreement that governs post-Brexit trade between the UK and EU,\u00a0de facto becomes part of the EU\u2019s single market.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For the EU, full Schengen checks will be carried out by Spain.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThis\u00a0is about legal certainty, confidence for businesses and people as well as a cooperative future that reinforces our mutual relationship,\u201d said EU trade commissioner\u00a0Maro\u0161 \u0160ef\u010dovi\u010d,\u00a0in a statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The lack of legal certainty has left cross-border trade between Spain and Gibraltar\u00a0operating\u00a0on an ad hoc basis.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Gibraltar was the final unresolved issue between the EU and the UK after they settled the Northern Ireland dispute in March 2023.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gibraltar will finally obtain free movement\u00a0into Spain\u00a0within the coming days,\u00a0after\u00a0the European Commission\u00a0confirmed it had published the draft law\u00a0that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":770908,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5226],"tags":[217083,802,748,2000,299,5187,1699,4884,225611,225608,225602,225605,225600,225603,225606,225609,225601,225604,225607,225610,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-770907","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brexit","8":"tag-typedefinedterm","9":"tag-brexit","10":"tag-britain","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-european","14":"tag-european-union","15":"tag-great-britain","16":"tag-identifier4403","17":"tag-identifier4436","18":"tag-identifier4437","19":"tag-identifier4438","20":"tag-namebrexit","21":"tag-nameeu-uk","22":"tag-namegibraltar","23":"tag-namesociety","24":"tag-termcodebrexit","25":"tag-termcodeeu-uk","26":"tag-termcodegibraltar","27":"tag-termcodesociety","28":"tag-uk","29":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116087237217989527","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/770907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=770907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/770907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/770908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=770907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=770907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=770907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}