While the UK Prime Minister Theresa May insisted that her final draft Brexit deal delivers on the referendum vote, groups representing the hundreds of thousands of Britons living across the EU say she had failed to deliver on their rights.
Theresa May told parliament and members of her government on Wednesday that the Brexit deal agreed with Brussels was the best possible agreement for the UK to leave the EU and one that delivers on the result of the referendum in 2016.
Her deal was however attacked by both leavers and remainers and it remains highly doubtful that the agreement would win the necessary support in her cabinet and then the British parliament before it can be signed and sealed.
The agreement certainly hasn’t won any support among campaign groups representing the 1.2 million British citizens living across the EU.
“Claims by the British government that ‘they have delivered on citizens’ rights’ are entirely false,” Brian Robinson from the Brexpats Hear our Voice campaign group told The Local.
“The draft agreement only touches upon some treaty rights, and ignores the rest.”
The citizens’ rights aspect of the bill was agreed back in March and the EU Commission confirmed to The Local on Wednesday that nothing has changed since then.
“The citizens’ rights part of the Withdrawal Agreement was agreed in full back in March,” the spokesman said.
That means that while Brits will be allowed to stay, work and receive healthcare in the EU countries where they live they will be lose their current right to onward freedom of movement – in other words the right to move to another EU country.
