Brexit and social security of mobile persons
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Brexit and social security of mobile persons Grega Strban1
Published online: 13 September 2017 © ERA 2017
Abstract If one looks at the history of UK and EU relations, the UK Leave vote may not seem a surprise. Attempts were made by the EU to enable further membership of the UK. Despite the Leave vote “offers” to the UK might still be relevant for other Member States. Among the most intriguing questions are: what social security rights will persons moving between the EU and the UK have after Brexit? Will there be an agreement including them or not, or will reliance be put on old and outdated bilateral agreements? Could the coordination instruments of the Council or Europe or the ILO be applied? Solutions will have to be found, since people will not stop moving just because of Brexit. Keywords Brexit · Social security · Social security coordination · Migrants · Free movement
1 Introductory thoughts The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (UK) has always believed in the importance of the European integration. In Zurich,1 Winston Churchill, former Prime Minister of the UK, spoke about the future of the maltreated and destroyed continent of Europe. To avoid such a tragedy ever happening again, Churchill pleaded for “building a kind of United States of Europe” with the reconciliation of Germany and France as its core. Although France was not really ready for reconciliation so 1 Winston Churchill delivered the speech at the University of Zurich on September 19, 1946. http://
churchill-in-zurich.ch/en/churchill/en-churchills-zurcher-rede/ (May 2017).
B Prof. Dr. G. Strban
[email protected]
1
Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia
166
Prof. Dr. G. Strban
soon after the Second World War had ended, Churchill advocated that “the first step in the re-creation of the European family must be a partnership between France and Germany. In this way only can France recover the moral and cultural leadership of Europe. There can be no revival of Europe without a spiritually great France and a spiritually great Germany. The structure of the United States of Europe will be such as to make the material strength of a single State less important. Small nations will count as much as large ones and gain their honour by a contribution to the common cause.” It was believed this would fortify the United Nations with strong regional, i.e., European structure. However, at the same time the UK never intended to be fully part of such European integration. Churchill has perceived UK “only” as a sponsor for the new Europe. He stressed that Great Britain, the British Commonwealth of Nations,2 mighty America and Soviet Russia must be the friends and sponsors of the new Europe and must champion its right to live. He concluded his speech with the famous quote “Let Europe arise!”.3 Such belief was fostered also during UK’s membership of the European Union (EU). Many exceptions and opt-out possibilities were negotiated by the UK. The historical (and present) importance of the UK was partially the reaso
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