by I’ve still got my original black British passport, somewhere. When it expired, as with all expired ones, the passport office asked if I wanted the old one back – which I said yes, on sentimental grounds (so I could use my hands laying on it eagerly and looking back at the sad young man in the photograph who had no idea what life was hurling at him).
It’s a handsome thing, the old pass – if not the brooding youngster – made of cardboard that feels as strong as oak and finished in a deep, almost glossy black, giving a sense of Morris’s solid dependability. Minor – that other pride. British emblem – may be inspired by the owner. I used this document to travel easily to the continent during the time Britain was in the European Union.
When Brexit happened – a vote I take due responsibility for, as I foolishly imagined it would get us a better deal – one of the few benefits I didn’t take for granted was that I would enjoy the back of the maroon euro passports and return to the old model. But, like the Morris car that looked like a poached egg, it has happened in history.
(Some time after Brexit, by the way, it became clear that there was no such thing as a mandatory European passport of standard size and color – Mrs Thatcher had just gone with it because she thought it was such a trivial matter, it wasn’t the single market project is not worth wasting.)
So, now I have a new UK passport, which isn’t quite black-but-dark-blue, and not only does it still look like a building society passport – it’s useless. To the dismay of around 100 British travelers every single day, it is no longer possible to enter the EU unless your passport was issued less than 10 years before the date you entered the country (so check the date issue); and valid for at least three months after the day you plan to leave (so look at the expiry date). You may also be asked if you have enough money to support yourself. The cheek!
Is this the Brexit we voted for? Well, yes: in the sense that we wanted to end free movement and we ended up with a deal that was as good as it was going to get, and it was too broken like Boris Johnson and Lord Frost.
As we are now discovering, the free movement of people is not a two-way street. Of course, if we can’t worry about pesky passport rules and queuing at the barrier when we get to CDG or VCE or BCN, we could always hire benches and paddle across to Calais to start our European odyssey. But we don’t, because we know – or should do – that Europeans have just as much right to control their borders and regulate who comes to visit, work or live on their land as they do. by the UK.
This is true of goods, especially food, moving across the English Channel for the most part. The Europeans had no problem putting up barriers to English cheese and Scottish salmon crossing the border, at great cost. But the idea of passing customs and checks is so troubling to the British that we have yet to impose them and probably never will – which has angered Welsh farmers.
Somehow, as the passport problems and border check fiasco show, the United Kingdom has managed to design itself a Brexit that represents the worst possible world. We don’t seem to be very effective at controlling who and what comes into the UK, and we face an expensive and insurmountable inconvenience trying to move ourselves or some shellfish to France or Belgium.
In recognition of the farmers’ tractor protest in London, we should also acknowledge that there are (and by “us” I mean Johnson, Liz Truss and Kemi Badenoch) some rotten trade deals with countries such as Australia, which will destroy eventually. large parts of British agriculture.
Next year, for everyone in government after the general election, the EU will impose even tougher rules. Or, rather, to enact the agreements we freely signed in 2019 and 2020.
So you will need an electronic visa waiver (which is actually a three-year visa type) called the ETIAS to enter the EU (except Ireland), and there will be a small fee. But it’s still more bureaucracy, and there’s no guarantee it won’t get worse. And, of course, in the post-Brexit world you’ll need to be extra careful about health insurance and driving in the EU too.
The EU has indicated that next year’s UK-EU Brexit review will not be an opportunity for yet another renegotiation of the Johnson deal; and all sovereign nations in the EU retain the right to impose their own residency rules and taxation on UK nationals who wish to live or work there.
Brexit, in other words, is the malignant gift that keeps on giving – and since the democrat majority voted for it in 2016, we shouldn’t complain when the man at the top of his regime sends the airport to the holding area and on the next flight back to where we came from. We want to do the same thing, after all.
