The situation

During its summit on March 23, 2018, the European Council adopted guidelines on the framework of the future relationship between the European Union and the United Kingdom following Brexit.

A closer look

Relevant EU departments must draft any future Brexit policies and must negotiate any future Brexit-related positions in line with these guidelines.

The relationship should include:

• “Ambitious provisions on the movement of natural persons”;
• “Coordination of social security rules”; and
• “Recognition of professional qualifications”.

The above language is taken directly from the guidelines and it is currently too soon to identify the practical implications of these guidelines.

Impact on the Brexit process

The publication of these guidelines gives the green light for EU and UK negotiators to start drafting policy documents in relation to future EU-UK immigration provisions.

Background

The European Council is composed of European heads of state, and provides political guidelines for EU legislative changes, including events such as Brexit. The European Council meets regularly to deliberate certain important transnational issues and the results of the meetings usually produce milestone political statements.

Looking ahead

The European Union aims to have a future relationship with the United Kingdom based on a balanced, ambitious and wide-ranging free trade agreement. The Withdrawal Agreement and its related policy documents will outline further relevant immigration rights of EU and UK nationals in each others’ countries.

The European Council will discuss remaining withdrawal issues and the future relationship at the next meeting in June 2018.

For more information, please visit Fragomen’s dedicated Brexit site, which contains news, FAQs, and analysis/commentary in the form of blogs, videos, webcasts and events.

This alert is for informational purposes only. If you have any questions, please contact the global immigration professional with whom you work at Fragomen or send an email to beneluxinfo@fragomen.com / londoninfo@fragomen.com.