Brexit news: Brits launch Netherlands court bid to keep EU citizenship rights in case that could impact one million ex-pats

Brits in the Netherlands have launched a court battle to keep their EU citizenship rights (file photo)
PA Archive/PA Images
Francesca Gillett17 January 2018

A group of Brits who live in the Netherlands have gone to court in a bid to keep their EU citizenship after Brexit.

Five UK nationals have launched a case in a Dutch court, claiming they feel “forgotten” and fear they may be forced to give up their rights when the UK quits the bloc in March 2019.

The landmark case could have knock-on effects for the estimated one million British ex-pats currently living in EU countries.

The group is asking a Dutch judge to put “prejudicial questions” about the status of UK nationals post-Brexit to the European Court of Justice.

One of the barristers representing some of the group of UK nationals.
AP

Launching summary proceedings at Amsterdam District Court on Wednesday, lawyer Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm said that while citizens’ rights are clear when a country joins the EU, nobody knows what happens when a country decides to leave.

Chris, Molly and Deborah Williams, three UK nationals living in the Netherlands and their barrister Jolyon Maugham.
AP

Under the deal agreed at the end of stage one Brexit talks in December, some detail of the rights of British EU citizens post-Brexit have been outlined but other issues like free movement are unconfirmed.

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People with EU citizenship includes the rights to travel and live anywhere in the EU as well as diplomatic protection and help from any EU country all over the world.

Briton Stephen Huyton, who works for a US firm operating in Europe and has lived in the Netherlands for 24 years, told th BBC: “Just because the UK voted to leave, it shouldn't be able to force citizens to give up their rights

“My children are confronted by choices I don't think are fair or reasonable

In the Brexit breakup, it feels as though they're just making up the rules as they go along. We feel as though we've been forgotten, so at least now people are noticing us.”