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The headlines this week seemed scary for these of us who fret about pink tape when travelling. “UK residents travelling to EU subsequent summer time must pay €7 visa-waiver cost” learn one.
Let me information you thru the most recent post-Brexit paperwork muddle – beginning with that very headline.
Fable 1: “UK residents travelling to EU subsequent summer time must pay €7 visa-waiver cost.”
Fortunately, that sentence turns into appropriate provided that you change “will” with “received’t”. Definitely, the toughest-ever tightening of pink tape for British travellers will start 10 weeks from now. However you received’t need to pay something for no less than one other yr.
Right here’s the timeline for the modifications. On 10 November 2024, the EU introduces the “entry-exit system” (EES) that can report the actions of non-EU guests to the Schengen Space (comprising all EU nations besides Cyprus and Eire, in addition to Iceland, Norway and Switzerland).
British passport holders should at the moment have their journey paperwork inspected and stamped. The excellent news is that passport stamping will finish. The unhealthy information is that each traveller should, in concept no less than, be fingerprinted and supply a facial biometric.
It’ll set off a great deal of absurd-looking workarounds, such because the sealed buses working via the center of Dover carrying passengers who technically are already in French territory.
Within the frankly unlikely occasion that the introduction of EES goes easily, six months later the Digital Journey Info and Authorisation System (Etias) might be launched.
This subsequent step in tightening frontier controls is an internet allow system much like the US Esta scheme, however cheaper at €7 (£6) and legitimate for longer: three years.
Add six months to the EES begin date and also you attain Could 2025. However though Etias is deliberate to start out then, you continue to don’t have to do something.
A six-month transitional interval is deliberate, throughout which Etias is strictly non-compulsory. It won’t be obligatory for potential UK guests to use on-line for permission to enter the Schengen Space till November 2025 on the earliest.
Even then, Brussels will present an extra six-month “grace interval”. Solely as soon as will you be allowed to enter the European Union with out an Etias. That takes us to the summer time of 2026.
Fable 2: “The UK is being punished due to Brexit.”
Nonsense. Work on strengthening the European Union’s exterior border started a decade in the past. British officers participated within the preliminary planning for the entry-exit system and on-line registration for third-country nationals. Theresa Could, as prime minister, recognised the potential for disarray again in 2016.
After the nation voted to depart the European Union, Boris Johnson’s authorities negotiated for British travellers to be labeled as third-country nationals – alongside the folks of East Timor and Venezuela. In different phrases, the UK requested to be topic to all the additional pink tape that everybody already knew was on the horizon. The EU agreed. So Brussels is delivering precisely what we wished. Rejoice.
Fable 3: “Had we remained within the EU we’d nonetheless be topic to all the brand new pink tape because of being exterior the Schengen Space.”
Garbage. Had been the UK nonetheless within the European Union, neither EES nor Etias would have an effect on British passport holders. Residents of EU international locations exterior the Schengen Space (at the moment Cyprus and Eire) needn’t undergo the entry-exit rigmarole nor get an Etias.
They’ll merely have their passport/ID checked on arrival and departure, normally through a fast-track line. The border official can solely confirm that their journey doc is legitimate, and that it belongs to them.
We’d have loved precisely the identical light-touch border expertise had we voted to Stay – or had the Johnson authorities not gone for a tough Brexit.
Fable 4: “It’s regular. There’ll at all times be queues and at all times have been.”
That response on X is one in every of many related remarks I’ve obtained. The “new regular”, with fingerprints and facial biometrics, might make these queues 4 instances longer, in line with some EU member state estimates.
Fable 5: The queues at UK airports might result in missed flights.”
Some flights may very well be missed on account of the brand new guidelines – however not from UK airports. There’s definitely potential for missed ferries on the Port of Dover, which faces the most important issues due to its constrained location and the presence of “juxtaposed border controls” – with French officers checking passports whereas nonetheless in Kent. However even when the queues imply you miss your deliberate departure, you may be placed on the subsequent out there crusing.
All flights from the UK to the Schengen Space might be checked on arrival on the European finish. There’ll probably be lengthy waits, however no less than you may be in the fitting nation as you stand and stew.
Checks will even be made on departure from the EU again to the UK, and that is the place that small danger exists. However I’m optimistic that the duty for every member state of the European Union to workers its borders appropriately might be revered.
Simon Calder, often known as The Man Who Pays His Method, has been writing about journey for The Unbiased since 1994. In his weekly opinion column, he explores a key journey problem – and what it means for you.
