Great Britain left the European Union on 31 January 2020. However, EU citizens who are legally and ordinarily settled in Great Britain until the end of 2020, when the 11-month transition period that began after Britain’s membership of the European Union ended – Brexit EU – continue to remain in Great Britain, retaining all their rights, but to obtain an indefinite residence permit. They must, in a formal legal name, apply for settled status in the European Union.
The same applies to citizens of the European Union, the wider European Economic Area made up of Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein, as well as Switzerland who have settled in Great Britain.
Depending on the time spent living in Great Britain, beneficiaries are granted full or pre-settled status.
The latter can be obtained by those who, at the time of application, have not yet completed five years of legal and habitual residence in Great Britain. Based on current regulations, they can also wait until the end of the five years and then apply for a permanent residence permit. In the period that has elapsed until then, they are also entitled to their full vested rights.
But based on an amendment proposal submitted by the British Home Office on Monday, the obligation to apply again will soon end in their case as well.
At the beginning of the year, the High Court in London announced that EU citizens with temporary settled status must apply to the British authorities again for permanent settlement permission in response to a claim brought by advocacy organizations for EU citizens living in Great Britain.
The advocacy organizations that made the claim say this commitment runs the risk that those who fail to reapply for any reason, such as simply forgetting, could be classified as illegal immigrants at any moment and deported by the British government.
Extension for two years
To prevent this, and in accordance with the order of the High Court in London, the British Home Office announced on Monday that as a result of the amendment to the law, the time available to obtain full and permanent settled status will be extended by two years for those who, after the expiration of their initial settled status, i.e. five until after a year, have not They apply in person for the final settlement permit.
The process takes place automatically, and the Ministry directly notifies the concerned parties of the extension.
This ensures that no one loses their temporary settled status in Britain even if they fail to apply for permanent settled status.
According to the information, the Ministry is also taking steps to ensure that, in as many cases as possible, the reclassification of the temporary settlement status to a final settlement permit becomes automatic for those entitled to it, that is, the obligation to apply again does not exist. No longer required.
In 2024, the Home Office in London will automatically verify that all those granted temporary settled status will continue to live in Britain on an ongoing basis, and the department will build safeguards into the system to ensure permanent settled status cannot be obtained without entitlement.
According to the ministry’s latest summary, by the end of the first quarter of this year, the British authorities had received 7.22 million settlement requests from European Union citizens.
At the top of the list were Romanian citizens with 1.48 million applications.
By the end of March, 174,910 Hungarians living in Great Britain had applied for settled status from the British Home Office.
