Subject: The Brief: Britain is not ready to take back control of its borders
From: EurActiv <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 22 Feb 2017 16:10:09 +0000

The Brief: Britain is not ready to take back control of its borders     
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    <http://eurac.tv/6IgM?sid=33541>    Today's EU policy news,
22.02.2017, 5PM

       = Britain is not ready to take back control of its borders =

      === By  James Crisp <http://eurac.tv/6Iit?sid=33541> ===

 Taking back control of Britain’s borders is not going to be as simple as
painting a slogan on the side of a big, red bus.

 Theresa May believes the referendum result gave her the mandate to crack
down on immigration. She will take Britain out of the single market becuase
access to it is conditional on the free movement of people.

 This has been rightly described  as economic vandalism
<http://eurac.tv/6IfX?sid=33541> but it also presents major practical
problems for the British government.

 Brexit minister David Davis today admitted the UK would need to continue
accepting EU immigrants after the UK quits the bloc. This will infuriate
those Leave voters who were seduced by promises of steeply dropping
immigration numbers.

 On a  trip to Lithuania <http://eurac.tv/6IfY?sid=33541>, Davis said it
would take  “years and years” <http://eurac.tv/6IfZ?sid=33541> to fill
all the jobs that are now held by EU immigrants with British workers.

 That’s not the only problem. The UK has no population register and it
will be hard to know which EU citizens were living in  Britain before
Brexit <http://eurac.tv/6If_?sid=33541>, according to a report by the
European Parliament’s employment committee.

 There are simply not the resources or systems in place to monitor EU
citizens living in Britain. The UK government knows this but its  Brexit
white paper <http://eurac.tv/6If-?sid=33541> is very  light on detail
<http://eurac.tv/6Ig0?sid=33541>.

 “We will design our immigration system to ensure that we are able to
control the numbers of people coming here from the EU,” it blithely
states.

 Any new immigration laws, once they are finally written, will  also face
scrutiny <http://eurac.tv/6Ig1?sid=33541> in both of the British
parliament.

 Britain has no national ID card system to keep tabs on immigrants.

  Tony Blair tried <http://eurac.tv/6Ig2?sid=33541> and failed to introduce
a card scheme and population register in 2007.  It was scuppered
<http://eurac.tv/6Ig3?sid=33541> because it was too expensive and because
of fears over civil liberties and data protection.

 One MP resigned in protest,  sparking a by-election
<http://eurac.tv/6Igp?sid=33541>, and earning himself much of the credit
for the initiative's downfall.

 He was none other than David Davis MP, the UK’s Secretary of State for
Exiting the European Union.

      == The Roundup ==

 We were expecting the Commission to come out with its white paper on the
future of Europe this afternoon. There was no sign of it.  Fortunately,
Jorge Valero has got  the inside track <http://eurac.tv/6Igq?sid=33541> of
what to expect.

 Gerry Adams, leader of Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein, told Catherine
Stupp that Brexit talks over the border between Ireland and Northern
Ireland were  doomed to fail <http://eurac.tv/6Igs?sid=33541>. The Irish
government is scrambling to  protect its agriculture
<http://eurac.tv/6Igt?sid=33541> industry from the threat of Brexit.

 Sir Ivan Rogers, former UK ambassador to the EU, told the  Brexit select
committee <http://eurac.tv/6Igu?sid=33541> in London that Britain must wait
until the mid-2020s for a trade deal with the bloc.

 Former British politician David Miliband has defended the UK’s foreign
aid budget and has denounced media attacks on it as “fake news”
<http://eurac.tv/6Igv?sid=33541>. Aid costs UK citizens about €340 a year
each, half what is spent on uneaten food.

 Emmanuel Macron told Theresa May he will stand up for the EU
<http://eurac.tv/6Igw?sid=33541> during the divorce talks and Italy’s
former PM, Matteo Renzi, is facing a party leadership challenge
<http://eurac.tv/6Igx?sid=33541>.

 The Dutch elections on 15 March could be a dry-run
<http://eurac.tv/6Igy?sid=33541> for France’s presidential election one
month later. The extreme-right party of Geert Wilders still has a narrow
lead <http://eurac.tv/6Igz?sid=33541> but his support is flagging. His
older brother, Paul, said in an interview: “I love Geert, but I reject
his ideology <http://eurac.tv/6IgA?sid=33541>”.

 The EU’s Ukraine deal continues to be controversial after the lower
house of the Dutch parliament voted in favour
<http://eurac.tv/6IgB?sid=33541> despite last year’s non-binding
referendum. The Association Agreement has been approved by the rest of the
27 member states.

 The EU-Canada trade deal CETA continues to drag on after 100 French MPs
appealed <http://eurac.tv/6IgC?sid=33541> to France’s constitutional
court. The Commission has warned France its economy is too imbalanced
<http://eurac.tv/6IgD?sid=33541> and that Germany’s current account
surplus is still too high.

 Mysterious radioactivity has been detected
<http://eurac.tv/6IgE?sid=33541> lately in Europe, confounding experts,
and a NGO is taking Italy to court over its pollution levels
<http://eurac.tv/6IgF?sid=33541>.

 France is fighting back against illegal drones by unleashing golden
eagles <http://eurac.tv/6IgG?sid=33541> to pluck them out of the sky. The
fearsome birds have shown a natural flair
<http://eurac.tv/6IgH?sid=33541> for destroying the unmanned machines.

 The results are in. 269 voters backed a European Commission ban on 
pineapple on pizza <http://eurac.tv/6IgI?sid=33541> by a 60% to 40%
margin…

      == Look out for... ==

 Enda Kenny, Ireland’s Taoiseach, is in Brussels tomorrow to meet
Jean-Claude Juncker. Brexit will doubtless be on the menu but Kenny has
other matters on his mind as well. He is  expected to quit
<http://eurac.tv/6IgN?sid=33541> after meeting Donald Trump in Washington
for the annual St Patrick’s Day celebration. Not exactly going out on a
high…

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