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Date Published: 06/05/2021
ARCHIVED - Valencian woman detained at UK immigration centre over lack of post-Brexit documentation
A Valencian woman will be held at a UK detention centre for 72 hours after she tried to enter the country without the correct post-Brexit documents.
The end of the transition period of the UK’s departure from the EU at the end of last year has meant an administrative headache for many Britons trying to legalise their rights to live and work in Spain, but the situation has also proved a problem for some Spanish in the UK with one Valencian woman becoming the latest to fall foul of new residency regulations.
The situation has been given significant coverage on Thursday by the Spanish media, highlighting that the issues caused by Brexit work both ways.
The 25-year-old woman, named only as Maria, previously worked in England in 2019 and flew back to London, where she has family, on Tuesday, May 4 to look for work.
After landing at Gatwick airport, border agents asked her for a negative PCR test, passport and reason for staying.
According to Maria’s friend, Oriol Arnedo, who has been telling Maria's story on Twitter after her phone was taken from her by border officials, Maria told agents she was in the UK to find work.
Despite having a National Insurance number from her time working in England before, Maria does not have her EU Settlement Status, so border officials told her she was not able to enter the UK looking for work.
Oriol says officers then held Maria at a room at the airport with other Europeans citizens while they tried to resolve her case. They also took her phone from her before giving a telephone number at Gatwick to one of Maria’s relatives.
When the relative tried to contact her, however, she had already been transferred to Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre in Bedfordshire, where she will be held for 72 hours until she is interviewed by the Home Office.
Since the UK voted to leave the EU in June 2016, European residents in the country have had to apply for EU Settlement Status to stay in the UK. Meanwhile, in Spain it is estimated that hundreds of Britons without legal residency have left Spain and flown back to the UK after their 90 day leave to be in the EU expired at the end of March.
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