Nearly one in five enquiries made by EU nationals to a free legal advice service for Europeans last year concerned issues relating to the UK, a report has revealed.
The findings, published by the European Citizen Action Service (ECAS), an NGO that provides advice from 60 legal experts through a service called Your Europe Advice, show that enquiries concerning Britain made up 18 per cent of legal queries raised in 2016.
Of a total of 20,491, the number of enquiries about the UK stood at more than 3,500, while Germany and France stood in second and third place, with between 2,500 and 3,000 each. The countries that were the subject of the least queries were Liechtenstein, Iceland, Lithuania and Estonia — all of which had less than 10.
The most prominent topics of enquiry were residence and family rights, with 1,816, entry procedures, with 1,691, and social security, with 1,387, according to the report.
The study, which was presented by ECAS at a conference in Brussels on Wednesday, noted that problems had been reported in the UK, particularly regarding family members of British citizens seeking to live in the UK after residing in another Member State under the CJEU’s Surinder Singh ruling.
It added that the reason for such a high number of enquiries received concerning the UK was “partly due to Brexit”.
The findings come days after the European Parliament’s chief Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt called on Theresa May to be "open" to a plan helping British people who want to retain EU citizenship after the UK leaves, saying he wants the European Union to make a “generous” offer to people in the UK angry at losing EU privileges.
An analysis by right-wing think thank Migration Watch meanwhile claimed highly skilled British people could work in the European Union after Brexit under an expanded visa scheme, saying the proposed expansion of the “Blue Card” scheme could provide opportunities for British nationals to work in the EU without any special agreement.
But Migration Watch added that the scheme is currently “far from complete”, with a reported 87 per cent of Blue Cards issued by Germany alone.
The scheme, which is modelled on the United States’ green card programme, aims to give highly qualified workers from outside the EU the right to live and work in a member state provided they meet specific conditions.
There are around 1.24 million Britons living in Europe, according to the latest 2015 UN global migration database figures. Spain hosts the largest group of UK citizens living in the rest of the EU at an estimated 309,000, while France hosts the second largest with 157,000 and Ireland next with 112,000.
