EU nationals will get ‘limitless’ access to Britain for TWO years and have until the end of 2020 to apply for ‘settled status’ under No Deal Brexit plans
Home Secretary Sajid Javid will grant the 20-month time frame to seize moral high ground from Brussels and allow 3,000,000 EU nationals to file the necessary paperwork
EU nationals will be given “limitless” access to Britain for more than two years after a ‘No Deal’ Brexit.
Home Secretary Sajid Javid is understood to have told Cabinet colleagues EU nationals will have to be waived through the border until September 2021.
The concession that will dismay Brexiteers is down to huge delays in No Deal preparations at the border.
Union insiders claim there is no way customs officials will be able to introduce new checks on EU nationals by the end of March 2019.
And they claim a recruitment campaign for 1,000 new Border Force staff has been “paused”. Mr Javid will outline his thoughts at a crunch Cabinet showdown over the UK’s post Brexit immigration strategy, the Times said.
Separately, the Home Office will give three million EU nationals until the end of 2020 to confirm their ‘settled status’ under Theresa May’s No Deal Brexit plans.
The Sun can reveal the Home Secretary Sajid Javid will allow the 20-month grace period in another attempt to seize the ‘moral high ground’ from Brussels.
It comes just days after the PM unilaterally declared all EU citizens will be allowed to stay in Britain – regardless of what happens to ex-pats living on the Continent.
Sources told The Sun that under a ‘No Deal’ any EU national in the UK by March 29 – Brexit Day – will be given the chance to ‘regularise’ their status.
Mr Javid wants to give them until December 2020 to file the necessary paperwork.
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But he has dismissed the idea of allowing them a deadline of June 2021 – a deadline that would be set if the UK and EU strike a Brexit deal.
The Home Office declined to comment. But a spokesman said: "We do not want or expect a no deal scenario and are confident that we will secure a deal with the EU.
“The Prime Minister has been clear that, in any scenario, there is no question of asking EU citizens living here to leave.”
Theresa May defended her decision to unilaterally EU citizens’ rights, saying it was the “right thing to do”. But she urged Brussels to “reciprocate for UK citizens leaving in the EU”.
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