EU “ready” to tighten immigration rules to keep the United Kingdom

AFP

AFP

Saturday, 15 July 2017 06:39

UPDATE
Saturday, 15 July 2017 06:39

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LONDON | officials from the european Union (EU) would agree to a tightening of immigration rules to go in the direction of the United Kingdom in order to keep the country in the european bloc, has said Saturday the former british Prime minister Tony Blair.

“European leaders, after discussions that I have had, are willing to consider changes to go in the direction of the United Kingdom, including the freedom of movement. However, this option is excluded”, regretted the former Prime minister in an article for his think-tank Institute for Global Change.

The freedom of movement within the EU and this makes it impossible for the Uk to control immigration have been one of the central motivations for the vote of the British in favour of an exit from the EU in the referendum of June 23, 2016.

David Cameron had obtained in February 2016, four months before the referendum, a strengthening of the “special status” in the United Kingdom in the EU, in particular with an “emergency brake” on certain social benefits paid to european migrants for seven years, but these reforms had been deemed inadequate by the electorate as pro-Brexit.

Tony Blair argues that the election of the French president Emmanuel Macron has changed the european dynamic.

“The rational examination of the options would include wisely the one to negotiate with the United Kingdom, maintaining it inside of a Europe ready to reform and make it half of the way towards us,” wrote the former Prime minister.

“The reforms are now in the program of Europe”, he judged.