UK proposal for a "Mobility Framework" is class-based Freedom of Movement with British characteristics. Keeps FoM for professionally trained middle classes, excludes working class people.
For the EU FoM is a universal right. UK concessions inevitable.
gov.uk/government/pub…
For the EU FoM is a universal right. UK concessions inevitable.
gov.uk/government/pub…
"Defined number of areas to seek reciprocal mobility arrangements" is where the UK will get minced in talks. Many areas where UK needs EU workers are rural, low paid services or industrial jobs. Every sector will want mobility arrangements for which the EU will demand concessions
"Mobility Arrangement" looks like a vastly bureaucratic system that the Home Office will struggle to police designed to replicate Freedom of Movement while pretending it is not.
Pointless and absurd.
Pointless and absurd.
Sharp eyed readers will note the White Paper speaks of seeking equivalent "Mobility Arrangements" with states that the UK achieves deep free trade deals with.
Implies extensive liberalisation of migration rules with states like India or Brazil. Is that what Leave voters wanted?
Implies extensive liberalisation of migration rules with states like India or Brazil. Is that what Leave voters wanted?
These mobility proposals try to resolve contradictory pressures. They draw on systems that manage limited flows of people from more distant countries while trying to acknowledge the economic need to sustain mass circulation of labour, students and tourists from nearby EU states.
The result points to a system that will involve far greater amounts of bureaucracy that the British state will struggle to enforce as lack of travel visas means that levels of circulation between EU states and the UK will stay high.
A system that claims to end FoM but cannot trigger significant decline in migrant numbers without damaging the economy will be a continuing source of tension with the EU, that will still be blamed, as well as within UK society as Leave voters fail to see their expectations met
When the EU opened up visa liberalisation for Ukrainians it effectively made the strategic decision that it could live with easier Ukrainian access to EU labour markets such ease of access would lead to even though it is ostensibly only for travel and tourism purposes.
A UK system that sustains open travel access for EU citizens makes it much more difficult for the Home Office to police and restrict labour markets as it does with citizens from other states. These Home Office proposals are a recipe for deepening dysfunction, not resolving it
